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Sri Lanka's Tamil Rebels Deny Agreement With Government
Sri Lanka's separatist Tamil Tiger rebels have denied that an agreement has been reached with the government for the commencement of peace talks.
Anton Balasingham, chief negotiator of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebels, emphatically denied any agreement reached on any matter and expressed surprise at the government's statement, describing it as "recklessly premature" and "factually incorrect," the Tamil net website said in a statement.
He said that the discussions on several sensitive issues have been going on for a considerable period of time under facilitation of Norwegians. But "the discussions are definitely not at a stage where an agreement can be said to have been reached and we are surprised at Mr. Kadirgamar's statement," he added.
"The Norwegian facilitator expressed his desire that statements on the discussions should not be made public until such time as agreement had been secured," he said.
The foreign ministry said in a statement on Thursday that Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar has in a letter to his Norwegian counterpart Thorbjorn Jagland requested Norway to urgently renew its efforts for peace talks between the government and LTTE rebels.
He said that the government has reached agreement with the LTTE rebels on several matters including measures to "alleviate any hardships and dangers" to civilians affected by the conflict.
Political analysts and diplomats here said that this indicates the possibility of a ceasefire being considered by the two warring sides, thus raising the hope for an early peace talks.
Ever since the LTTE started they four-month unilateral ceasefire on Christmas eve last year, the rebels have been demanding the government to reciprocate their truce offer, but the government insisted that a ceasefire is possible only after peace talks between the two sides make substantive progress.
In the past two years Norway has been trying to broker peace in the war-torn country where separatist Tamil Tiger rebels have been fighting since 1983 for an independent Tamil state in the north and east of the country.
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