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Sri Lankans fear resumption of war as peace talks crack
Not quite India but close enough. Feel free to move this, Fred.
That usually happens when the boys go home and pick up their guns. The rebels said they suspended the peace talks because the government was not doing enough to normalize the area, particularly removing the military from city centers and the airport. The military is hesitant because it would have to fight its way back in if the talks fail and war resumes, as has happened twice before. Fool me once, ... When the British left Sri Lanka in 1948, Jaffna was a vibrant city with graceful colonial buildings, elegant Christian churches, Hindu temples and an enterprising Tamil minority. But ethnic tensions were already simmering, with the Tamils alleging discrimination by Sri Lanka's dominant Sinhalese. After a massacre of Tamils in 1983, a Tamil uprising began in the north. The Tamils demanded equal rights and a separate homeland. From 1990 to 1995, the rebels, who are formally known as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, ran a virtually independent state in the Jaffna area until the military pushed them into the jungles farther south. Since then, Jaffna has been under government control, while parts of the surrounding 1,000-square-mile peninsula have been ruled by the Tigers. The rebels have their own police, civil administration, jails, customs, courts and navy. There are 40,000 to 50,000 government troops on the peninsula and an estimated 6,000 to 10,000 Tamil Tigers, which holds regular exercises to display their weapons and parade their "Black Tiger" suicide bombers. Nasty bastards; these boomers usually get who they're going after. In the latest peace talks, the rebels said they would give up their demand for independence and settle for autonomy under a federal system. Doubts remain about the Tigers' sincerity because of their history of breaking truces and their traditional opposition to democracy. Posted by: Steve White 2003-05-05 |
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| http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=13855 |