Derana News 04 05 2009 End of War

Des Browne makes first visit to Sri Lanka since dispute with leaders



Des Browne, Britains former Defence Secretary, arrives in Sri Lanka today on his first visit since its government rejected his appointment as special representative to the Indian Ocean island in February.

Sri Lanka has refused to allow Mr. Browne to visit in his new role to press international calls for a ceasefire with the Tamil Tigers and for aid agencies to be given access to the 50,000 civilians the United Nations estimates are still on the frontline.

It has permitted Mr. Browne to visit as part of a cross-party British parliamentary delegation to meet Sri Lankan officials and visit camps where an estimated 170,000 civilians are being accommodated and screened after fleeing the fighting.

The other members of the delegation, which will be in Sri Lanka for two days, are John Bercow, Malcolm Bruce, Edward McGrady and Mohammed Sarwar.

Relations between Britain and Sri Lanka have soured dramatically since Downing Street appointed Mr. Browne and began to express concerns in public about civilians stuck on, or fleeing, the front line.

David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary, returned empty-handed from Colombo last week after a joint mission with Bernard Kouchner, the French Foreign Minister, to appeal for a ceasefire.

Mr. Miliband also had a heated exchange with Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, the Defence Secretary, who is also the Presidents brother, over reports that the army was still shelling civilians on the front line.

Sri Lanka says that a ceasefire would allow the Tigers to regroup and rearm, and accuses Britain and other Western countries of undermining its efforts to finish a 26-year civil war that has killed more than 70,000 people.

However, Mahinda Samarasinghe, the Human Rights Minister, suggested later that the Government was considering an amnesty for Tigers who surrendered.

Mr. Samarasinghe, who is due to meet the parliamentary delegation, said that officials from the Attorney-Generals Department were studying the legal basis for a possible pardon but a final decision had not been made. He said that any such offer would not be open to Velupillai Prabhakaran, the Tamil Tiger leader.

The Tigers wrote an open letter to the British and French foreign ministers urging them to help to negotiate an immediate ceasefire.

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[jsen217]

hello its not end its start beware sri lanka ltte is coming soon johnsen from india banglore



[BULLBULLI]

Even not give to cup of water also those sakkili tamil peoples,there so waste peoples in the world.We are living here EUROPE,we no who are the real tamils are they.Here in europe everywhere they try to given very wrong news about sri lanka but....but these european peoples know it.Tamil are big liers.

White peoples never mind them even their shit ASS.White peoples saying this peoples don´t have do anything that´s why they just try to given wrong news.

[netlife007]

ත්‍රිවිද හමුදාවට, ජානාදිපති තුමාට, අරක්‍ෂක ඇමති තුමාට තුනුරුවන් සරණයි.

[Srilankan1983]

The Remaining 10,000 people are LTTE war hero Families , they Love LTTE , they never want to come back to army control area, they want to support to LTTE , they will die with LTTE ,but they never come back.

we need to finish LTTE with that all 10,000 civilians ( LTTE war hero Families )

do it fast