International help urgently needed, says Mangala

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) - Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera says he told US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that Sri Lanka urgently needs international help to spur the LTTE back to peace negotiations and to stop a resurgence of civil war.

"Our democracy is a democracy under siege today, due to the intransigence of the LTTE," Samaraweera said in an interview with The Associated Press on Thursday, referring to a recent spike in violence blamed on the Tigers.

"Despite all these provocations," Samaraweera said, President Mahinda Rajapakse, who campaigned on a promise to take a tough line in negotiations with the LTTE, is "still willing to walk that extra mile for peace."

Samaraweera's private meeting with Rice was part of his Government's first US trip since Rajapakse took over after November elections, and analysts and lawmakers hope it will help revive peace talks between the Government and the LTTE stalled since 2003.

"The President has shown that his threshold of patience is extremely high," Samaraweera said, noting that Rajapakse has extended six invitations to LTTE leaders to resume talks. So far, the Minister said, those efforts have been ignored, and there are no current prospects for future negotiations.

"We are still willing to be patient, if we can get the LTTE back to the negotiating table," he said. "And for that we need the support of the international community."

Samaraweera said Rice indicated that she "realises the urgency in resuming negotiations."

Samaraweera met Wednesday with Republican Sen. Richard Lugar, Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, who told the Minister of "the urgent need for a genuine ceasefire and serious dialogue that addresses the ethnic issue," Lugar's office said.

Samaraweera also briefed US officials on efforts to rebuild from the December 2004 tsunami.

Robert Hathaway, Director of the Woodrow Wilson Center's Asia Programme, said there had been hope, after the tsunami, that the two sides might come together to help rebuild. Bitter fighting ended between the Indonesian Government and rebels in the province of Aceh after peace efforts picked up pace in the wake of the tsunami.

Prospects for similar reconciliation, Hathaway says, have "largely, though not completely, evaporated."

Still, this week's trip, he said, would give US lawmakers and other top officials a chance to find out what the international community can do "to keep the situation from dissolving into all out war again."