The Opposition UNP, TNA, SLMC, UPF and the CWC believes that President Chandrika Kumaratunga’s scheduled inaugural meeting of the National Advisory Council on Peace and Rehabilitation scheduled for October 4 would be a meaningless exercise without first restarting talks with the LTTE.
The UNP’s Political Affairs Committee which met on an invitation of the President followed by a letter from the Secretary General of the Peace Secretariat Jayantha Dhanapala last Thursday presided over by leader Ranil Wickremesinghe after lengthy discussions decided not to attend the inaugural ceremony and asked the government to postpone the consultation and to resume talks first with the LTTE if at all this process needs to be meaningful, a senior spokesman for the committee, said on Sunday.
The convenor of the TNA Parliamentary Group and Secretary General of the EPRLF Suresh Premachandra yesterday charged that this was a tactic of the government to delay the resumption of the peace talks with the LTTE on the basis of the ISGA.
This consultation would be meaningless without the resumption of talks which was an urgent exercise if ever the government believed in any consultation.
"We the TNA believe this to be an exercise to pull wool over the eyes of the international donor community with a view to get the aid pledged at Tokyo released for development activities in the South.
As far as the Thamil people were concerned they gave a mandate and want the government to resume the talks which brokedown since the LTTE submitted its proposals for ISGA in October 2003.
"We won’t participate as we don’t see the need for any consultations before the resumption of talks with the LTTE" concluded Premachandran.
The Secretary General of the SLMC M. T. Hassen Ali said yesterday that they believed this mass consultation without speaking to the main stakeholders was a futile effort.
"We don’t want to participate in mere consultations without the resumption of talks with the LTTE."
The government should identify the main stakeholders the political parties that had been given a mandate for peace and invite these parties only after the stalled talks are resumed.
"We believe according to the present situation this consultation could only create more divided opinion."
The leader of the UPF P. Chandrasekeran said yesterday that though he believed in the resumption of talks with the LTTE should be the first before any consultations, he had informed Jayantha Dhanapala that he would consider to attend the opening inaugural ceremony.
A senior spokesman for the CWC said that as a party representing the minority plantation people and also having extended its unconditional support to the government for the resumption of the peace process believed that the talks should be commenced first before any consultation.
