If LTTE chief caught, SL to consider Indian handover plea

Sri Lanka will "positively" consider any plea by the Indian government to hand over LTTE supremo Velupillai Prabhakaran, wanted in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case, if he is caught alive, the country's foreign minister Rohitha Bogollagama has said.

"If the Indian government makes a request to hand over the LTTE leader (Prabhakaran) to India in the event he is arrested alive by the security forces, Sri Lanka would consider it positively under the existing law as he is a murder suspect in India," he said.

"The Indian government is yet to make such a request," the Daily Mirror quoted the minister as saying during a briefing by ruling United People Freedom Alliance (UPFA) on the fall of rebel-held Elephant Pass on Friday.

The minister said only some individuals in India had requested Sri Lanka in this regard, but did not elaborate.

Since there is only an Extradition Arrangement between India and Sri Lanka, short of a treaty, deportation of wanted people could be undertaken only on grounds of mutual requests.

Meanwhile, Bogollagama also said Sri Lankan government did not believe in a military solution to address the genuine grievances of the minority communities in Sri Lanka.

On the contrary, the government was firmly committed to a political solution in finding answers to these issues, "which should be done in a spirit of give and take by all democratic forces in the country," he told senior diplomats this week.

On reimposing a ban on LTTE after six years, Bogollagama said this was done due to acts of terrorism and other excesses committed by the outfit and "its orchestrated campaign to collect funds" to commit such acts.

Bogollagama said the reasons for the ban included the LTTE's activities relating to procurement or smuggling of arms, ammunition and explosives which he said had the potential of adversely affecting international and regional peace.

The minister said the decision by New Delhi to proscribe the LTTE and renew the ban periodically also stems from the threat that the LTTE poses to the territorial integrity of India.

Bogollagama referred to the repeated calls by president Mahinda Rajapaksa to the LTTE to renounce terrorism and come to the negotiating table.

"However, the LTTE spurned all these pleas and continued to persist on the path of unbridled violence and terrorism, causing massive loss of innocent lives and destruction of property," Bogollagama told the diplomats.