Sihala Urumaya brokers 'truce' between PA-UNP

[TamilNet, Friday, 03 August 2001, 06:58 GMT]
The Sihala Urumaya (SU), the hardline Sinhala Buddhist nationalist party has appealed to the main opposition, United National Party to drop the no-confidence and impeachment motions against the People's Alliance government to end the present political crisis. The General Secretary of the SU Mr.Tilak Karunaratne made this request to the leader of the UNP when he met the latter Thursday.

Mr.Tilak Karunaratne met Mr.Ranil Wickremasinghe Thursday and discussed to find ways and means to diffuse the present tense situation in the country's political arena created with the introduction of no-confidence motion and the intended impeachment motion against the PA government and followed by the prorogation of parliament for two months and a non-binding referendum fixed for August 21.

Mr.Ranil Wickremasinghe promised the SU leader that "his party's position in this regard will be notified to him shortly".

The meeting between the leaders of SU and UNP took place consequent to the discussion Mr.Tilak Karunaratne had with the President Chandrika Kumaratunge few days back. During that discussion, SU Leader submitted some proposals to President that included the formation of national government, reconvening of parliament and the re-introduction of Emergency Regulations.

Mr.Tilak Karunaratne agreed to bring the PA and UNP under a common programme to end the present political conflict.

The Sinhala Urumaya, a newly formed political party last year to espouse the cause of Sinhala people, polled above one hundred thousand votes in 2000 October parliamentary election. The party got only one seat in the Parliament on account of the total number of votes it polled island wide at the general elections on October 10.

Mr.Tilak Karunaratne entered politics through Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP). Later he joined the UNP and become a parliamentarian. He left UNP last year and formed the SU. He condemned both main parties stating "they are not working to safeguard the interests of the major community but depending on parties belonged to minority communities, to capture power."