Tigers’ deadly power game

In clear and obstinate defiance of pro-peace opinion in this country and abroad, the LTTE is sticking to its guns of disrupting law and order in the North-East. Reports indicate that a string of attacks on law enforcers has been carried out in the North over the past couple of days by the Tigers, resulting in the death of one soldier on Wednesday.

The LTTE is also the driving force behind a number of confrontations between the civilian populace of the North - including university students - and the law enforcers. Therefore, it is clear that the LTTE intends triggering a wave of lawlessness in the North-East, with the obvious intention of wrecking the Ceasefire Agreement.

In other words, the Tigers are least inclined to explore peaceful options of ending the conflict, thus proving that they are violently at variance with the governmental policy of working out a political solution to our conflict.

What other conclusion could the impartial observer draw from the Tiger - inspired spate of violence in particularly the North? The LTTE is demonstrating its callous disregard for its obligations under the Ceasefire Agreement and we hope the international community, in particular, would draw the correct inferences.

Fortunately for Sri Lanka, the security forces and the Police are sticking to the highest norms of professional conduct. While it is the intention of the LTTE to provoke the law enforcers into breaking the ceasefire, the latter are behaving with exemplary calmness. We commend our law enforcers for this inspiring restraint and call on them to continue in the same vein in the face of LTTE provocation.

The law enforcers need to prove that as a vital organ of the State they are fundamentally different in thinking and conduct from the Tigers. They cannot afford to be seen as undisciplined and violently impulsive although the Tigers may not have any such qualms. The law enforcers need to keep the law at all times and we fervently hope the highest standards of professional conduct would be continued to be maintained by them.

The Tigers, however, present peace-loving sections including the State and moderate opinion the world over with a set of highly troubling posers. Are they for working out a political solution to our conflict or not? If they are for peace they should work cooperatively with the State towards evolving an honourably settlement to the conflict. They need to warmly clasp the hand of reconciliation extended to them by the Government. Instead, the Tigers are giving every indication of getting back to the destructive path of war.

This amounts to totally blighting the future of the Tamil people, whom the Tigers claim to represent. This Tiger logic is most befuddling. If they are desirous of meeting the legitimate aspirations of the Tamil people they would be working in collaboration with the State towards finding a political solution to the conflict instead of attempting to undo the ceasefire and plunge the country into war.

In the event the ceasefire is violated by the Tigers and unsettled conditions re-introduced into the North-East, it is the Tamil people who would suffer most.

It is apparent, therefore, that the LTTE does not have the interests of the Tamil people at heart. The Tamil populace is, instead, being turned into a porn by the LTTE in its deadly power game.