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The LTTE leader's speech deals with five themes. The first is a complaint that the international community has not in defining terrorism, distinguished between a national liberation movement and a terrorist movement. The second is the allegation that the Government of President Kumaratunga has refused to open the doors for peace negotiations despite the LTTE's offer to engage in constructive peace talks. The third is the aspirations of the Tamil people. The fourth is the stand of the LTTE vis-a-vis the forthcoming General Election. The fifth is the lifting of the proscription of the LTTE as a necessary prerequisite for the LTTE to participate in peace talks as the 'legitimate, authentic representative of the Tamil people".

In recent years, international thinking on the question of terrorism, even well before the events of September 11th, in the United States, had been moving clearly in the direction of outlawing acts of violence against the public as a means of promoting a political cause. As early as 1988, the SAARC Regional Convention on the Suppression of Terrorism categorised a number of offences such as murder, assault, kidnapping, hostage - taking, offences relating to firearms, weapons and explosives as "terroristic" "when committed as a means to perpetrate indiscriminate violence involving death or serious bodily injury to persons or serious damage to property".

In 1993, India proscribed the LTTE after the assassination of Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. In 1997, the United States declared the LTTE a foreign terrorist organisation, together with many other organisations, and has twice renewed this designation. In 1998, Sri Lanka, having put up with countless acts of terrorism by the LTTE finally proscribed it in 1998, after it had committed the heinous crime of bombing the Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic (The Dalada Maligawa) in Kandy, one of the world's holiest Buddhist shrines, a few days before the 50th anniversary celebration of Sri Lanka's Independence.

In 1998 and 1999 the United Nations adopted two important Conventions on the Suppression of Terrorist Bombings and the Suppression of Terrorist Financing, respectively. In 2000, the United Kingdom, in implementing these conventions, enacted a terrorism act in which terrorism was defined as 'the use or threat of action which involves serious violence against a person or serious damage to property, where the use or threat is designed to influence the government or to intimidate the public or a section of the public, and the use or threat is made for the purpose of advancing a political religious or ideological cause". In February 2001, the LTTE, together with a number of other organisations, was proscribed in the United Kingdom.

Horrendous

After the horrendous events of September 11th in the United States, the United Nations Security Council unanimously adopted a comprehensive resolution requiring all member States to take measures to combat terrorism and to report to the Security Council within 90 days on the measures taken. In October 2001, Canada adopted an Anti-Terrorism Act in which 'terrorist activity' is defined as 'an action that takes place either within or outside of Canada and is an offence under one of ten UN anti-terrorism conventions and protocols or is taken or threatened for political, religious or ideological purposes and threatens the public or national security by killing, seriously harming or endangering a person or property. Under the new Canadian law a number of groups, including the LTTE, were designated as 'terrorist groups'.

On November 12, the UN Security Council reaffirmed "its unequivocal condemnation of all acts, methods and practices of terrorism as criminal and unjustifiable, regardless of their motivation, in all their forms and manifestations from wherever or by whom ever committed". On November 21, the Legal Committee of the United Nations adopted by consensus a resolution which again re-affirmed the current international thinking on the meaning of terrorism and measures to combat it. This resolution declares that "Criminal acts intended or calculated to provoke a state of terror in the general public a group of persons or particular persons for political purposes are in any circumstances unjustifiable, whatever the consideration of a political, philosophical ideological, rational ethnic, religious or other nature that may be invoked to justify them."

The common element in all these statements on terrorism is the unequivocal condemnation of the use of violence to promote a political cause by provoking a state of terror in the general public, a group of persons or a particular person and thereby intimidating the public or influencing the government. These various definitions of terrorism also make it clear that no cause or consideration can be invoked to justify an act of terrorism. Motivation is irrelevant. Thus, international thinking has now reached the point, from which there will be no return , of rejecting conclusively the argument that an act which would otherwise qualify as a terrorist act is justifiable when committed in pursuance of a political or other type of cause or motive.

Judged by these universally accepted criteria it can reasonably be argued that the LTTE's massacre of unarmed, innocent civilians - men, women, children and monks; the assassinations of a former Indian Prime Minister (the grandson of Jawaharlal Nehru) and a Sri Lankan President, and numerous democratically elected leaders, including Tamil leaders and the distinguished human rights activist, Dr. Neelan Tiruchelvam; the bombing of the Sacred Temple of the Tooth Relic (Dalada Maligawa) and the Central Bank, the attempted assassination and partial blinding of the present head of State; the destruction of civilian aircraft at the international airport - were not terrorist acts? Were these not acts of "indiscriminate violence", "calculated to provoke terror in the public", "indiscriminate violence", "calculated to provoke terror in the public", "intimidate the public" and "influence the Government" for a "political purpose" - the purpose being to advance the so-called "liberation struggle" of the LTTE? The bombing of the Central Bank by the LTTE in Colombo was conceptually and symbolically no different from the destruction of the World Trade Centre in New York by al-Quaida - in the one case a large explosive device was driven into the building by a suicide driver, in the other a large aeroplane was converted into an explosive device and flown into the building by suicide pilots.

Mr. Prabhakaran calls on the Western democratic nations to "provide a clear and comprehensive definition of the concept of terrorism that would distinguish between freedom struggles based on the right of self - determination and blind terrorist acts based on fanaticism. He says: We are not demented individuals that commit blind acts of violence impelled by religious and racist fanaticism". If the truck bomb attack on the Dalada Maligawa was not a "blind terrorist act based on hatred and fanaticism" what else could it possibly be - an expression of love, a manifestation of religious harmony, an overture to peace? The bombing of the Dalada Maligawa by the LTTE is no different from the bombing of the Bamiyan Buddhas by the Taliban. Mr. Prabhakaran's plea is that a so-called "freedom struggle" should be accorded a licence to commit acts of terror. This is precisely what the international community has refused to concede.

Theme

The second theme - that President Kumaratunga's Government has refused to open the doors to peace - is, to his knowledge, patently false. President Kumaratunga is the only leader of Sri Lanka to have tabled in Parliament a draft Constitution which guaranteed substantial autonomy in the regions of the country where the majority of the Tamil speaking people live. She is the only leader to have taken the bold decision to invite, in concurrence with the LTTE, a foreign third party to facilitate a dialogue between the parties. Was that a calculated strategy to prolong the war or a genuine attempt to achieve the elusive peace that is so much desired?

It should be recalled that about October 1999, the LTTE launched a military campaign which overran substantial areas of the Vanni, continued during the Presidential election of December 1999 and dimaxed with the suicide bomb attack on the President. The second phase of their offensive took them to the gates of Jaffna in May 2000. Throughout that entire period the LTTE made it clear to the Norwegian Government that it had no interest in peace; its only interest at that time was to retake the Jaffna peninsula. Why was the LTTE battering the gates of Jaffna - to open the doors of peace? Having failed to take the peninsula by armed might and having waited until the results of the October 2000 election were known, Mr. Prabhakaran invited the Norwegian representatives to meet him on November 1st, 2000.

On that occasion he did not ask for de-proscription as a condition for entering into peace talks. In his November 26th, 2000, "Great Heroes" speech he said twice that the LTTE was willing to enter into negotiations without pre-conditions, although the proscription had been in force since the Dalada Maligawa bombing in January 1998.

In December 2000 the LTTE unilaterally declared a cease-fire without informing the Norwegian Government. The Government of Sri Lanka did not respond because it had experiences in the past with unilateral cease-fires. The Government had, in fact, been advised by the Norwegian Government to refrain from acting unilaterally. It had been advised that in a situation such as the one that prevails in Sri Lanka even a small step taken by both parties together is much better than a unilateral step taken by one party without consulting the other. The Government of Sri Lanka accepted that advice.

Mr. Prabhakaran is aware that in the first quarter of 2001 considerable work was done by the LTTE representatives and the Government, with the help of Norway, to work out an agreement for the free flow of commercial goods into the Vanni and the cessation of sabotage and other hostile acts in the South. The parties had gone to the extent of working out in detail the quantities of petrol, diesel, cement etc. that would be freely allowed into the Vanni for sale at market prices together with a complete lifting of all the remaining embargoed items except for seven - which included bombs, guns, explosives etc.

On April 6th, 2001, one of the Norwegian representatives went into the Vanni to meet the LTTE representatives with a view to securing final agreement on the proposal. The Government of Sri Lanka had indicated to the Government of Norway its willingness to communicate its acceptance of the Agreement in a letter to the Norwegian Government which was to have been signed on April 11th, 2001. However, the Norwegian representative returned from the Vanni without securing a final Agreement because for the first time the LTTE representatives had raised the question of de-proscription. The LTTE must, therefore, accept fairly and squarely responsibility for the breakdown of the negotiations on that humanitarian agreement which, if it had been completed, and internationally monitored, as discussed, would have led to the commencement of political negotiations a few months later.

Labelled

Mr. Prabhakaran says that the Government "falsely labelled the peace envoy Mr. Eric Solheim as being inclined towards the Tigers and side-lined him." That is far from the truth. What happened was that in the early part of 2001 it became clear to the Government that Mr. Solheim was giving press interviews in different countries about the peace process and answering questions on a website in a manner that considerably raised his own profile while jeopardising the atmosphere of discretion and low-key activity that has always characterised the facilitation efforts of Norway in various situations.

The Government invited the Norwegian Foreign Minister of that time to discuss the matter in Colombo on June 7th, the Government expressed its concern at Mr. Solheim's conduct and suggested that the Government of Norway, through the Minister of Foreign Affairs, should take charge of the negotiations on the Norwegian side. The Foreign Minister agreed that the Norwegian style was to conduct negotiations discreetly and quietly and that on Norway's part the level of involvement should be upgraded.

Consequently, the Norwegian Government constituted a team that comprised the Foreign Minister and Deputy Foreign Minister ex-officio, the Norwegian Ambassador in Colombo, Mr. Solheim and an official of the Norwegian Foreign Ministry. Mr. Solheim remains a member of the Norwegian team.

On June 7th 2001 the Government gave to the Norwegian Foreign Minister, to be conveyed to the LTTE a proposal to resuscitate the humanitarian agreement, engage in a mutually agreed cessation of hostile military operations with international monitoring and verification and commence negotiations without any conditions as proposed by Mr. Prabhakaran in is November 27th speech of 2000. The same proposal was made to the United National Party on June 19th, 2001, when talks commenced with the People's Alliance on the 19th, 2001, when talks commenced with the People's Alliance on the possibility of a national government being formed. The Norwegian Government reported back that the LTTE was not interested in the proposal. The United National Party found itself unable to join the People's Alliance in making a joint call to the LTTE to accept the proposal. The attack on the Katunayake airport on July 24th, 2001, effectively thwarted the possibility of any further progress on peace talks.

The third theme is the aspirations of the Tamil people. Those who would scrutinise the speech for an abandonment of a separate state or a specific reference to autonomy will be disappointed.

The fourth theme is the stand of the LTTE in the coming General Election. There is a thinly veiled attempt by Mr. Prabhakaran to psychologically intimate the Sri Lankan voters, manipulate the democratic process and tilt against the incumbent administration.

Having said that elections hold no interest for the LTTE since their struggle proceeds outside the parliamentary process he goes on describe the election as a contest between polarised political forces with the Tigers as the central theme of the election. He calls upon the Sinhala people to reject "militant and racist forces" and litters his speech with indictments of President Kumratunga's Government thereby clearly signalling his preferences and antipathies.

De-proscription

Finally, there is the question of de-proscription. On this Mr. Prabhakaran is clear, emphatic and decidedly dogmatic. He says: "It is our policy that unless and until the Sri Lankan Government cancels the banning order on us, recognises our movement as the true and legitimately organised political representative of the Tamil people, we will not participate in political talks. We remain steadfast in this policy ... Conflict resolution has a prospect in Sri Lanka only if the ban on the LTTE is removed."

It seems incredible that the LTTE would seriously expect to be deproscribed at this point of time, in view of its abominable track record of mass terrorism and assassinations ranging from the massacre of worshippers at the Sacred Bo-Tree in Anuradhapura in 1985 through the murder of Rajiv Gandhi in Tamil-Nadu in 1991 right up to the assassination attempt on the Sri Lanka Prime Minister a few weeks ago. De-proscription can be considered only if and when the peace process has verifiably advanced to the point of irreversibility and it is clearly agreed that all discussions will take place within the parameters of a single, indivisible State of Sri Lanka.

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