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Jaswant to visit Lanka, clarify India's stand

Josy Joseph in New Delhi

External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh will visit Colombo tomorrow to hold discussions with President Chandrika Kumaratunga on the situation in the island nation and clarify India's stand.

According to sources, Singh will convey the government's stand on the Tamil issue. He will tell Kumaratunga that Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam president and Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M Karunanidhi's statement was 'his personal suggestion', not that of the National Democratic Alliance government.

Karunanidhi's suggestion that Sri Lanka be split on the lines of Czechoslovakia, which was divided into the Czech Republic and Slovakia, led to an uproar in Lanka, and deep concern in the Indian establishment.

The DMK and other Tamil regional parties are traditional supporters of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam's claim for a separate Tamil nation to be carved out of Lanka.

At a special meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Security earlier this week, the government reiterated that it would stick to its original stand, that any solution to the Lankan crisis should not threaten Lanka's national sovereignty. Commerce Minister and DMK politician Murasoli Maran was a special invitee to the meeting.

Analysts and intelligence agencies have been warning that if Eelam becomes a reality, the repercussions will be felt in Tamil Nadu, where a separatist movement could find supporters. But the government believes Tamils will feel let down if India does not take an interest in the island's ethnic problem.

Sources point out that Singh's visit, the first by a senior minister after fighting broke out between the LTTE and Lankan troops near Jaffna, is also intended to convey the government's concern at the developments in Lanka. "We would like to convey to the Lankan government that we are not mere bystanders, and are gravely concerned," government sources said.

Intelligence agencies have been reporting that the present lull in fighting and the suicide bomb attack on a Lankan minister are part of the LTTE's attempts to cover up the fact that it is regrouping for a major offensive. "There is credible information that the Tigers are receiving fresh supplies of weapons and regrouping in the jungles near Jaffna," sources say.

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