'India has realised danger from LTTE'

President Mahinda Rajapaksa has said that India and the US are supporting the war against LTTE terrorism because they themselves feel threatened by the Tigers.

"India now realises that it could be the next target of the LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam). And I am told that the LTTE has taken a contract to motivate Al Qaeda cadres to become suicide bombers," Rajapaksa told IANS on the sidelines of a press conference here Tuesday.

The President described his Government's relations with New Delhi as 'very good' and added that if he had to allow any foreign Government delegation to go to Kilinochchi to talk to the LTTE, it would be the Indian government.

"I prefer India. It is our neighbour," he asserted.

The Sri Lankan Government has not been allowing international aid givers like the US, European Union, Britain, Japan and Norway, collectively known as the Co-Chairs, to go to Kilinochchi to meet with the LTTE. "The danger lies in the possibility that the LTTE might kidnap a currently active Sri Lankan Tamil leader," he added.

Earlier, at the press conference, Rajapaksa said that he preferred the India-Sri Lanka Accord of 1987 to be the basis of a solution to the ethnic conflict in the country because it was the most practical thing to do, even though in the early years, he was opposed to the accord. IANS