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Patience and compromise vital for peace

There are high expectations regarding the peace talks currently being conducted between the government of Sri Lanka and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. The first three rounds of talks held in Thailand and in Norway have produced rapid and sometimes surprising results that have held the attention of both the people of Sri Lanka and the world community.

Those results augur well for the future of the entire process, but may have created the impression that the process is going forward apace and that a solution is close at hand.

While the process has gone forward, and indeed chances for a permanent peace are probably better than they have ever been before, the road ahead is arduous and it is likely that there will be many hiccups on the way.

One of the most important pillars of the current peace process is the presence of the Norwegian facilitators who are husbanding the talks. They have worked hard to keep the negotiators on track and at crucial times they have stepped in to nudge the parties to the conflict on to the right path. By showing our good intentions, we have to keep the Norwegians on board and continue to go along with them and also accept the good offices of the rest of the international community as well if we are to come to a just and acceptable solution.

The position of the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission has also been vital to the peace process. It is its task to monitor the Ceasefire and up to now the fair and impartial pronouncements made by the mission has increased its credibility and prevented any incident from causing the breakdown of the CFA.

Both the Norwegian facilitators and the SLMM have stressed the need for symmetry between the two parties. In its diplomacy the Norwegians have maintained this strict symmetry in organising events, in addressing the negotiators and making judgments.

It is in this light that the most recent assessment of the situation carried in this newspaper yesterday must be viewed.

The SLMM noted in its statement reviewing the year of the ceasefire, that "an unrealistic normalisation programme in the name of progress and development should not be allowed to come in to force at the expense of security as this could undermine the building of a permanent peace." The Mission noted that to ensure peace the forces of both sides must be kept stable. "The balance of forces is the basis of the Ceasefire Agreement," it emphasised.

This too is part of the symmetry. As commentators in this newspaper and others have pointed out the military stalemate was a key precursor to the peace negotiations and the issue of the High Security Zones in the Jaffna Peninsula have to be dealt with in this manner.

The SLMM also paid tribute to the government forces, which were not held responsible for any violations of the agreement.

As much as the LTTE wishes to keep its armed strength intact until a final deal is struck, the Sri Lankan government will want to maintain its military presence at a suitable level until peace is finally concluded.

This issue is one we have to deal with now. It will not be easy to find a compromise that will satisfy the concerns on both sides and not endanger the peace process. But that compromise will have to be found at some stage. And no doubt the facilitators are now working hard on reaching such a deal.

If the first three rounds of the talks provided major developments, but the talks to be held in Thailand in the second week of January is likely to see a consolidation exercise where a whole range of matters are discussed.

In the third round, the negotiators surprised themselves by coming to an agreement about the outer parameters of a power-sharing deal that will eventually shape the political solution to the long-standing ethnic conflict. In the coming round discussions will begin on the nitty-gritty of such a solution.

Various models need to be looked at and an eventual framework evolved which will serve the unique problems of Sri Lanka

No doubt the hard bargaining will begin then and Sri Lankans as well as the international community will have to exercise some patience to see further developments in this regard.

We have been at war for nearly twenty years. This has been Asia's longest-running internal conflict, and it is unrealistic to expect quick results.

Let's be patient and support the peacemakers.

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