Son disowns Premadasa's anti-India approach

The politician-son of Ranasinghe Premadasa, the Sri Lankan president who ordered Indian troops out of the island in 1989 sparking a diplomatic row, says he is keen to develop excellent ties with New Delhi.

In an interview before ending an 11-day visit to India, Sajith Preamadasa of the opposition United National Party (UNP) also credited President Mahinda Rajapakse of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) with pursuing a military campaign against the Tamil Tigers that he said was seen widely as "most efficient and prudent".

The 39-year-old MP chose words carefully when he was asked about his father's demand made in 1989 asking Indian troops trying to disarm the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in the island's war-hit northeast to go home, saying Sri Lankans were capable of resolving their differences themselves.

The Premadasa administration also provided arms and ammunition to the LTTE to take on Indian soldiers, the last of whom left Sri Lanka in March 1990. Within months, the LTTE resumed an armed conflict that continues to this day, having claimed around 65,000 lives.

"I have done an authentic critique, a realistic critique of my father's policies," Premadasa told IANS. "I have ascertained the pros and cons, its negatives and positives. And I have formulated my own vision. But since my father is no more, I do not intend criticizing his policies."

He quickly added: "I have a great deal of passion and determination to surpass my father's noble achievements in the domestic arena.

"But when it comes to external relations, generally with the international community, more specifically with our great neighbour India, my thoughts and my vision and my perception are totally and absolutely different. I shall work for a frank, direct, authentic and transparent relationship with India.

"There were substantial deficiencies in external relations, especially with bilateral relationship with India," Premadasa said, referring to his father's presidency which ended when an LTTE suicide bomber killed him at a 1993 May Day rally in Colombo. "I shall champion all such efforts to correct it."

While making it clear that he was only articulating popular feeling in the Sinhalese-majority southern Sri Lanka, Premadasa explained why Colombo had the upper hand in the fighting against the Tamil Tigers.

"In terms of military strategy, it is perceived to be a success by a vast majority in Sri Lanka, particularly in the so-called south," he said. "I also see a situation where the government has very efficiently and methodically utilized all available resources to conduct a military and diplomatic approach to the conflict...

"I see the government approach extremely popular. It is very well received. For the first time people are beginning to state that here is a government, unlike any other, using a military approach in the most efficient and prudent manner. This is the perception."

He said incentives provided to security forces in the form of encouragement and quick promotions coupled with better weapons were "the distinct features of the present government's military strategy".

President Rajapakse, who took power in November defeating the UNP's Ranil Wickremesinghe, is "quite popular", Premadasa said.

"Right from inception he was very keen on achieving a settlement through the peace process. But for a variety of reasons, the process was scuttled. Ultimately these and other factors pushed him towards the warpath. Presently he is popular among the masses. I think he is quite popular among the masses."

Rajapakse, he added, would not be "a one-term president but a two-term president".

Premadasa, however, underlined the need for a political solution to the ethnic conflict.

"While military victories have given an upper hand (to the government), it is indispensable to have a political solution to this intractable issue. Many may claim that military strategy alone can achieve the objectives. I don't subscribe to that."

(IANS)

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