Sri Lanka's president and prime minister met yesterday in an attempt to defuse the political crisis threatening the island's peace process, but failed to make a breakthrough, sources said.
Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe held two-and-a-half hours of talks at the tightly-guarded office of President Chandrika Kumaratunga, who had invited him to discuss creating a government of national unity.
It was their first meetings since Kumaratunga, a critic of the prime minister's handling of the peace process with Tamil rebels, triggered the crisis last week by sacking three ministers and suspending parliament.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Sources from both camps said that while the leaders did not broker a solution to their stand-off, they agreed to hold another meeting next week.
Journalists were not allowed to cover the meeting between the president and prime minister, political rivals from different parties who share power in an awkward cohabitation.
A source close to the prime minister said he did not press for the re-instatement of the sacked ministers, but urged Kumaratunga to take over the Norwegian-backed peace process with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).
Wickremesinghe argued he could not handle the peace process unless he was in full control of the government, including the defense, interior and information portfolios taken by Kumaratunga.
Kumaratunga in turn expressed concerns about the security situation in the country following her allegations the government had jeopardized national security by being too soft on the rebels.
The prime minister earlier made it clear he would not accept a national unity government.
Wickremesinghe has said the peace process, which he revived after defeating Kumaratunga's party in 2001 polls, has been damaged by the president's Nov. 4 move against his Cabinet colleagues.
The political turmoil has cast a shadow over a visit here by Norwegian peace envoys who are trying to salvage a peace process aimed at bringing peace after three decades of bloodshed which have cost over 60,000 lives.
Kumaratunga's spokesman Sarath Amunugama declined to comment on the talks, but insisted that Kumaratunga would not give back the key defense portfolio.
Amunugama justified Kumaratunga's action last week, saying the president must constitutionally hold the defense portfolio and that it had been given by mistake to Wickremesinghe's government after the 2001 vote.
With no end in sight to the standoff between the government and the president, political sources said Kumaratunga's party was making overtures to its former Marxist ally, the JVP.
Kumaratunga had been in talks with the JVP from early this year to form a grand alliance to fight future elections, but the talks failed due to differences over sharing portfolios in a future government.
However, her sacking of three key ministers from the present government went some way to appease the Marxists.
An alliance of Kumaratunga's party and the JVP would still be short of the 113 seats required in parliament to topple Wickremesinghe's government which enjoys the backing of 130 legislators in the 225-member assembly.
Amunugama dismissed reports that Kumaratunga was planning to call snap elections four years ahead of schedule.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not