 The Tamil Tiger rebels on Friday backed away from a demand to be able to directly receive international funds for tsunami victims, and said they were putting their independence struggle on hold to deal with the disaster.
"The international community need not deliver aid direct to LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam)," said the rebels' top peace negotiator Anton Balasingham. | I think my surprise meter just pegged. |
The LTTE have consistently demanded they be given access to some of the foreign aid that has poured into the island since the tsunami struck one month ago. The Sri Lankan government has said aid disbursement should be centralized in its hands for greater efficiency. The Tigers, however, have said insufficient aid was reaching territories under guerrilla control. Norway, which brokered a truce between the two warring sides three years ago, has been mediating efforts to bring them together to coordinate tsunami relief and reconstruction. Hans Brattskår, Norway's ambassador, also was expected to participate in the closed-door meeting. If an agreement is reached, it would mark a significant step: the first collaboration on a political level since peace talks collapsed in April 2003. The rebels began fighting in 1983 to create a separate state for Sri Lanka's 3.2 million Tamils, accusing the country's 14 million Sinhalese of discrimination. A 2002 Norwegian-brokered truce appeared increasingly tenuous before the tsunami that dealt equal devastation to both sides of the conflict. |