SRI LANKA: LTTE LEADER'S HEROES' DAY SPEECH

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 COLOMBO 001995 SIPDIS SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/29/2016 TAGS: PREL PTER PHUM CE SUBJECT: SRI LANKA: LTTE LEADER'S HEROES' DAY SPEECH UNLIKELY TO AFFECT CONFLICT REF: COLOMBO 1985 Classified By: AMBASSADOR ROBERT O. BLAKE, JR. FOR REASONS 1.4(b) and ( d) ¶1. (SBU) SUMMARY: Following Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) leader Prabhakaran,s annual November 27 Heroes' Day address (ref),media reports quoted Sri Lankan President Rajapaksa as discounting LTTE threats of resumed violence and calling on Prabhakaran to engage directly with him in talks. Other reactions ran the gamut, with a pro-LTTE parliamentarian supporting the LTTE call for an independent state and an anti-LTTE politician criticizing the Tigers. Most interlocutors agreed that Prabhakaran's speech contained no real surprises and will likely have no material effect on the ground situation. End summary. ¶2. (U) On November 27 Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) leader Prabhakaran gave his annual "Heroes' Day" speech (reftel). On November 28 the Indo-Asian News Service published President Mahinda Rajapaksa's reaction. Rajapaksa, speaking from New Delhi (where he was on a state visit),told the news service he isn't taking Prabhakaran's threats seriously. Rajapaksa reportedly asked Prabhakaran to negotiate directly with him -- after criticizing the LTTE leader's history of war-mongering. ¶3. (C) In a conversation with pol FSN, Dr. K. Vigneswaran, General Secretary of the Ahila Ilankai Tamil United Front and former advisor to Minister Douglas Devananda of the anti-LTTE Eelam People's Democratic Party, echoed Rajapaksa's sentiments. He noted that Prabhakaran has always sought an independent state. He added that the LTTE's enforced boycott of the November 2005 presidential election had tipped the scales in favor of the perceived hard-liner Rajapaksa, thereby alienating moderate Tamils. But he thought the Tamil diaspora had responded well to Prabhakaran's speech, especially in light of the food shortages affecting mostly Tamil civilians in the north and east. According to Vigneswaran, the government should try to undercut the LTTE. The cooperation between the governing Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) and opposition United National Party (UNP) was a good start. Vigneswaran believed that Prabhakaran criticized the pact for that very reason, adding that this should spur the two major Sinhalese parties on to draft a strong and viable proposal for a political settlement. �0A;¶4. (C) In a separate conversation, Vavuniya District Judge ¶M. Elancheliyan called the CFA effectively dead. Dr. Jehan Perera, Director of the local think tank National Peace Council, concurred, telling Pol FSN that Prabhakaran's assessment of the 2002 Cease Fire Agreement as "defunct" simply reflects the ground reality. However, Prabhakaran's comments were neither new nor constructive, Perera said. Prabhakaran simply stated the obvious -* civilians were suffering -- but refused to recognize the LTTE's own role in creating the current situation. Prabhakaran's attempts to garner international sympathy by highlighting the obvious are not useful, Perera thought; the LTTE and government must hold substantive discussions to resolve the conflict. ¶5. (C) Pro-LTTE Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarian Suresh Premachandran disagreed, praising Prabhakaran's call for an independent state. In a discussion with Pol Chief, he accused President Rajapaksa of following a purely military agenda, citing air raids in the north and east and the government's closure of several roads, leading to civilian food shortages. He said the government is not sincere in its stated wish to negotiate, so the Tigers have no choice but to fight for a separate state. Premachandran asked whether the U.S. was supporting the government of Sri Lankan (GSL) against the LTTE at the cost of ignoring government human rights violations. He blamed the GSL for "pulling the LTTE into a war." ¶6. (C) In a conversation with Pol FSN, Muslim parliamentarian M.L.A.M. Hizbullah of the National Unity Alliance said Prabhakaran's comments were the expected response to GSL military action against the Tigers. COLOMBO 00001995 002 OF 002 Hizbullah said people in the eastern city Batticaloa had welcomed the Heroes' Day speech, thinking it was the prelude to achieving their longed-for independent state of Tamil Eelam. Hizbullah thought the Co-Chairs should put forward a strong proposal of their own in order to get the two sides back to negotiations. ¶7. (C) COMMENT: The reactions to Prabhakaran's Heroes' Day speech ran the expected range, from Rajapaksa,s politically expedient call for direct negotiations (not likely to materialize) to the TNA representative's defense of the LTTE leader's views. While it may appear surprising that the Muslim politician Hizbullah seemed almost sympathetic to the Tigers, his pragmatic stance reflects the views of many (though not all) Sri Lankans. The international community will continue to press both sides to return to negotiations. However, any further escalation of hostilities would make it difficult to pursue a peace agenda. Fortunately, it seems unlikely Prabhakaran's speech -- in and of itself -- will have any lasting effect on the course of the conflict. BLAKE