No role for LTTE in Interim Council - PA

[TamilNet, Sunday, 18 June 2000, 17:01 GMT]
The Government of Sri Lanka denied on Sunday media

The statement was issued by the Sri Lankan government's Special Media Centre.

The statement which is signed by the Director of Government information, Ariya Rubasinghe follows.

"The Government categorically states that there is no truth whatsoever in the statements made by some organizations that the Government has reached agreement to establish an Interim Council with the support of the LTTE to administer North-East Provinces.

"The Government also wishes to state that these statements are not only utterly false but also misleading the general public.

"At the talks the Government held with the United National Party last week on the Constitutional Reforms, the government reached agreement with the main Opposition that the Referendum would be the means of deciding whether the Northern and Eastern Provinces should be merged as one Province or should be separate.

"Until such time the referendum is held, it was discussed that an Interim Council would be established to administer the currently merged North-East province. The Gazette Notification of November 11, 1999 has already made provision for such an Interim Council. The President on behalf of the Government has specifically stated that only those representatives of the registered Tamil, Muslim, and Sinhala democratic political parties representing the North-East should participate in the proposed Interim Council. The President has vehemently rejected the participation of the murderous terrorist LTTE organization in an Interim Council.

"It is the Government stance that LTTE could participate in an Interim Council only on entering the democratic political mainstream by shunning all murderous terrorist activities," the statement further said.