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Sal tree marks Sri Lanka talks in Thailand

NAKHON PATHOM, Thailand, Sunday (AFP)

Sri Lanka's warring parties and their Norwegian peace broker marked the success of a crucial round of talks at this Thai resort by planting a cannon ball tree Sunday.

The tree, known in Sri Lanka as Sal was planted by Sri Lanka's chief negotiator G. L. Peiris and his Tamil Tiger counterpart Anton Balasingham.

Norway's deputy foreign minister, Vidar Helgesen, was also on hand to help put the tree in the ground outside the "Ruen Kaew" (glass house) banquet hall at the Rose Garden resort here, near the Thai capital Bangkok.

Sal is revered by Sri Lanka's majority Buddhists who believe the Buddha was born in a park of Sal trees, which can grow to 23 meters and bear cannonball-size fruit clumped along their broad trunks. Peace talks host Thailand has close Buddhist ties with Sri Lanka as both follow the Theravada stream of Buddhism. The Siam Nikaya sect was established in Sri Lanka in 1751 by Thai monks, who helped revive Buddhism when it tumbled into decline after it had been brought to the island from India 2,500 years earlier. Sri Lanka is considered a cradle of Buddhism and a repository of the religion's original scriptures but has been ravaged by ethnic violence for more than three decades.

Talks that opened Thursday were the second round in efforts for the government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) to achieve a lasting peace.

The first round, held at a Thai naval base in September, had early success after the LTTE abandoned their demands for a separate state.

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