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SOUTH ASIA INTELLIGENCE REVIEW
Weekly Assessments & Briefings
Volume 2, No. 17, November 10, 2003
Data and
assessments from SAIR can be freely published in any form
with credit to the South Asia Intelligence Review of the
South Asia Terrorism Portal
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On the Brink, Again
Guest Writer: Iqbal Athas
Consultant Editor and Defence Correspondent, The Sunday
Times, Colombo
There is
a strange if not bizarre paradox in Sri Lanka's peace process.
Twenty months after a fledgling ceasefire, the Tiger rebels
made public their much awaited demands to end their near
two-decade-long 'armed struggle'. They want autonomous self-rule
in the North East, outside Sri Lanka's Constitution and
laws.
A failure to heed their demands within five years, they
made clear, would lead to elections. That it would lead
to a separate state of Eelam is a certainty, even though
the rebels have not said so.
One would have expected these demands, a solid foundation
for a separate state, to cause a political storm, if not
riots; a politically sensitive Sinhala south has been screaming
over concessions, including a radio station, already given
to rebels. Yet they did not.
Instead, causing increasing uncertainty over the peace process
is an entirely different issue - a confrontation between
the ruling United National Front (UNF) Government and the
main opposition People's Alliance (PA).
It was sparked off by President Chandrika Kumaratunga's
decision last Tuesday to sack three Ministers - Tilak Marapana
(Defence), John Ameratunga (Interior) and Imtiaz Bakeer
Markar (Mass Communications). She took control of the portfolios.
"Do you think the President did this to embarrass you whilst
you are my guest," asked US President George W. Bush, from
Premier Wickremasinghe during a meeting at the White House.
He was in Washington to seek US support for the peace process.
Prime Minister Wickremasinghe did much the same in New Delhi
during talks with Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee last
month. He not only won Indian backing then, but also an
assurance for a Defence Co-operation Agreement with Sri
Lanka.
The Sri Lankan Premier was seeking these assurances as part
of his 'international safety net.' That these initiatives
came twenty long months after the ceasefire was both significant
and important. They were not prompted by the tough rebel
demands. Even before they were made public, he had appealed
to India, and the visit to the US followed shortly thereafter.
The reason was mounting security concerns.
The rebels have dominated the northern Wanni since they
were ousted from the Jaffna peninsula in 1995. They ran
their own administration, which includes courts, police
stations, banks and a tax collection machinery. They have
now extended this apparatus to the east under the ceasefire.
They doubled their strength in the North East, and have
recruited new cadres, including children. They have smuggled
in state-of-the-art military hardware, including surface-to-surface
missiles and surface-to-air missiles, and have begun setting
up an air wing using two micro-light aircraft.
In marked contrast, the Sri Lankan Armed Forces find themselves
in a quandary. Desertions have been higher during the ceasefire,
and there was poor response to repeated recruitment drives.
The UNF has not tried to re-equip the Armed Forces for fear
of offending the rebels. Training on a limited scale led
to dwindling ammunition stocks. When stocks reached alarming
levels, India came to their aid by sending in emergency
supplies.
This emerging scenario has led to an increasing change in
the military balance. To the uninitiated, President Kumaratunga's
move came as a surprise. To any discerning student of politics
it was not. There have long been strengthening indications
that such action was inevitable. The President had been
writing stinging letters to both Premier Wickremasinghe
and Defence Minister Marapana over these developments. Some
of her concerns have been made public, such as the LTTE
build-up in the North Eastern port district of Trincomalee,
where a threat has emerged, not only to the strategic port
there, but also to Indian investments, including the World
War II vintage oil tanks leased out to the state-owned Indian
Oil Corporation (IOC). Other correspondence, however, still
remains private.
For the Wickremasinghe Government, the lessons learnt over
last week's events arise out of a neglect of the intelligence
services and the Armed Forces in the misguided belief that
the rebels would be offended if the Government emphasised
the perceptions and agendas of these state agencies.
Indeed, just a month after the UNF was voted to power, the
Police raided a forward operations cell of the Directorate
of Military Intelligence. This unit in a city suburb was
the centre from where deep penetration units infiltrated
rebel areas in the East and assassinated their leaders.
It was mistaken for a hide out from which military officers
had purportedly planned to assassinate ruling party leaders.
When the Navy sank two rebel cargo vessels, one in March
and the other in June, state run media reports publicly
chided them for their action. The same fate befell the Army
when it was involved in actions against the rebels.
President Kumaratunga, interestingly enough, is acting under
a Constitution whose chief architect is Premier Wickremasinghe's
mentor, the late President J.R. Jayewardene. Under that,
she is the Head of State, Head of the Executive, Head of
the Government and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Force.
Premier Wickremasinghe's Government, which took office in
December, 2001, set up an Interior Ministry for the first
time and placed the Police within its fold. It was previously
under the Ministry of Defence.
With the takeover of the state media, a major propaganda
effort is being made to explain President Kumaratunga's
actions. Premier Wickremasinghe, returning to Colombo to
a crowded reception, declared that he had the support of
the US and the international community. He vowed to continue
his campaign for peace. He has rejected a public appeal
made by President Kumaratunga for a 'National Government',
and added that the President, who has taken over defence,
should also conduct the peace process. Otherwise he wants
both matters to be placed in his hands.
President Kumaratunga is yet to respond. The Norwegian facilitators
arrived this week for talks to carry the peace process forward.
The choices left to the President are severely limited.
If she does not yield to Premier Wickremasinghe's demands,
she would have to talk to the rebels. They may not agree.
Time is limited. When Parliament meets after prorogation
ends on November 19, 2003, in theory, if the UNF hands in
a motion to impeach President Kumaratunga, it would debar
a dissolution and polls thereafter. If Parliament continues
to sit, with a majority in his favour, Wickremasinghe could
block funds for the running of the Presidency.
Sri Lanka is again on the threshold of a major political
crisis.
The Refugee Conundrum: Getting
there?
Guest Writer: Kinley Dorji
Editor, Kuensel, Thimpu
The bilateral
effort by Bhutan and Nepal to find a durable solution to
the problem of 100,000 people in the United Nations High
Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)-run refugee camps in eastern
Nepal has been like a journey through an extremely long
tunnel; but there is now, at least, a small light at its
end.
The problem began after the Government in Bhutan conducted
a nation-wide Census in 1988. By the early 1990s, thousands
of ethnic Nepalis, largely believed to be illegal immigrants,
and some Lhotshampa (Bhutanese of ethnic Nepalese
origin) supporters, were violently protesting the results
of the Census that found a large 'non national' population
living in Bhutan.
The first half of the 1990s saw a campaign of violence against
Government institutions, including schools and hospitals,
public and private property, as well as villages. For Bhutan,
it was an unprecedented spate of attacks on human and institutional
targets. At the same time, families from the southern districts
left for Nepal, with a majority eventually ending up in
the camps.
As the emerging political leaders threatened to repeat the
'Gorkha' success in India, when Darjeeling wrested autonomy
from the West Bengal Government at Calcutta, it stirred
in the Bhutanese a sense of vulnerability that stems from
the country's geopolitical situation as a tiny state in
a populous region. The Kingdom became sharply aware of the
demographic implications, as the Nepalese population moved
eastwards across the Himalayan foothills. The 720-kilometre
porous border that had, in the past, symbolized the relaxed
relations with the neighbours, suddenly assumed ominous
dimensions.
Immigration became a thorny issue and the Bhutanese Government
took a firm stand on its citizenship laws, upsetting not
only the illegal immigrants, but Lhotshampa supporters
who had inter-married across the border. An ethnic rift
became palpable, with local politicians entrenched across
the Duars (Literally: gates or doors; referring to
the 18 points of access into Bhutan from the Indian plain)
encouraging both illegal immigrants and Lhotshampas to
leave the country so that the ethnic Nepalese population
could come back as a political force.
In 1993 the two Governments settled down to bilateral talks
when the then two Home Ministers, Sher Bahadur Deuba and
Lyonpo Dago Tshering, held their first meeting in Thimphu
and signed a formal agreement in Kathmandu in 1994 during
the first Ministerial Joint Committee (MJC). With Bhutan
maintaining that the people were not all refugees, the two
Governments decided to divide the people into four categories:
Bhutanese who had been evicted; Bhutanese who had emigrated;
non Bhutanese; and Bhutanese who had committed criminal
acts.
The next 12 years saw this process move forward, watched
by a largely skeptical audience. What many people overlook
today is that there was visible progress in the talks. The
decision to categorize the people was followed by the establishment
of a Joint Verification Team (JVT) of five officials from
each Government to examine the case for all the people in
the camps, and then by the actual process of verification
from the Damak-based JVT office.
The progress was slow and painful. The media, the involvement
of numerous NGOs, concerns of the international community,
and internal politics maintained pressure on both governments.
Nepal, with its volatile domestic politics, saw a number
of changes in Government during this period, and the Bhutanese
National Assembly Members kept up relentless pressure on
their Government not to compromise. A total of 11 Home and
Foreign Ministers held the succession of MJC meetings that
alternated between the two capitals.
The often-protracted bilateral process saw many hitches,
not to anyone's surprise given the complexity of the problem.
The initial lack of progress was widely believed to be a
result of the directly opposing views widely reported in
both countries. Nepalese lobbyists initially wanted to send
all 100,000 people to Bhutan. Bhutanese Assembly Members
did not want even one person. Bhutan insisted that the people
should first be placed in the four categories to take a
systematic approach, while Nepal wanted the categories reduced
to just two: Bhutanese and non Bhutanese.
But, step by painful step, the two Governments made notable
progress, most of it in the past year. It was eventually
political concurrence and a broader perspective at the bilateral
level that drove the technical process along. Nepal's Ambassador
at Large described it as the establishment of "a new chord
of determination to move ahead, based on a sense of goodwill
and determination…"
The JVT had categorized the 12,183 people in the first camp,
Khudunabari, in 2001 and, during the 12th MJC meeting in
March, 2003, the two Governments 'harmonized' their views
on the four categories. Bhutan would repatriate people in
Category 1, those in Category 2 would be given the option
to apply for Bhutanese or Nepalese citizenship, the people
in Catetory 3 should return to their own countries, and
suspected criminals in Category IV would be governed by
the laws of the two countries.
The 15th MJC in October agreed on a time-schedule to start
the process of repatriation, settlement, and resettlement
of the refugees. The delegates said they hoped it could
start by February and then verification could start in the
second camp, Sanischare.
The two Governments may have expressed their full commitment
to solve the problem but it is critical at this stage that
the politicians around the camps, as well as NGOs and the
international community, now encourage the process. As much
as a majority of the regional and the international community
wants a solution, there are some who do not, for political
reasons. Meanwhile, the politics in the two countries will
continue to affect the process - not always for the better.
Nepal's political turbulence looks set to continue and the
political reformation in Bhutan will strengthen the stand
of those opposing the Government.
The international audience has an important role to play
at this stage. Largely dominated by the views of NGOs, particularly
human rights groups, both genuine and those with hidden
agendas, many observers have been condemning the bilateral
process and, consequently, obstructing rather than analyzing
the issue or facilitating progress. In a situation where
small countries can easily be pressured into hasty decisions,
misguided pressure could easily derail the process.
For Bhutan there is very little room for compromise. "We
are talking about the country's survival," one Assembly
member said in July. "We cannot succumb to any pressure
when our sovereignty is at stake."
The October MJC came as a relief to most observers. The
Ministers reportedly applied political pressure to overcome
a bureaucratic stalemate over forms and figures. Nepal's
Foreign Secretary said, after the meeting in Thimphu on
October 23, 2003: "We are sometimes inching forward, sometimes
leaping forward, but we are moving forward."
And it is expected that, with the JVTs experience in the
first camp, the process will be faster in the six others,
although nobody expects the process to move without hitches.
Bhutan, more than anyone else, has always wanted to move
forward in the process because it has also been dealing
with the serious threat posed by Indian militants who are
camped in its south eastern districts.
As the JVT heads back to Jhapa in the last week of November,
concerned observers have reason to be optimistic. The approach
of the two Governments has proved to be increasingly realistic,
thus raising hopes for a solution. They have also insisted
on the bilateral process. Former Nepalese Foreign Minister,
Narendra Bikram Shah, said that it was in the power of the
two countries to find a solution to the problem. In response
to calls for the problem to be 'internationalised', Nepal's
Ambassador at Large, Dr. Bhekh Bahadur Thapa, pointed out
to journalists in October that it was already internationalised.
The entire world knew about the problem and was following
it. The two Foreign Ministers pointed out at their meeting
in Thimphu in October that it was more important to maintain
the momentum in the bilateral process.
Today there is general agreement that, in seeking a solution,
it is important for the societies involved not to be disrupted.
In a region that has proved to be potentially unpredictable,
stability is critical in the common interest. It is not
a secret that Bhutan, the smallest player in this difficult
game, is concerned about its stability. It is the basis
of the country's primary goal, survival.
It is also important, at this crucial stage, to allow the
refugees themselves to make their choices without pressures,
without raising false hopes or fears, as is being done every
time individuals or organisations or Governments visit the
camps and make pronouncements they cannot deliver.
A Prime Minister in Wonderland:
The Peace Process and Its Perils
Guest Writer: Praveen Swami
Special Correspondent, Frontline
Prime Minister
Atal Behari Vajpayee's peace initiative on Jammu and Kashmir
(J&K) has passed through the mirror between the real world
and into that strange place Lewis Carroll called Wonderland.
In Wonderland, as literary critics have taught us, all participants
must submit to a tyranny of meaninglessness. At once, they
are overcome by a compulsive urge to decode the babble that
passes for dialogue, and to search for sense in even the
most trivial and insignificant text. Six months ago Vajpayee
announced in Srinagar that "spring will return to the beautiful
Valley soon, the flowers will bloom again and the nightingales
will return, chirping." So far, the only chirping to be
heard is that of the Kalashnikov - but heard from within
Wonderland, it would seem, the ugly staccato rattle of gunfire
contains within it the muted strains of birdsong.
Little is known about just what transpired in Wonderland
- in this case, the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS)
- on October 22, when the Union Government announced Deputy
Prime Minister L.K. Advani would negotiate with the secessionist
All Parties Hurriyat Conference (APHC).
The CCS, sources say, discussed the peace initiative for
a little over half an hour; no voices of dissent were raised.
Union External Affairs Minister Yashwant Sinha was charged
with offering Pakistan the now-famous twelve-step peace
proposals.
Advani's appointment as negotiator with the APHC, a source
present at the meeting said, was presented as a fiat,
and was not the outcome of discussion. Again, however, consultations
on negotiations with the APHC began at least a fortnight
before the CCS meeting. Former J&K Chief Minister Farooq
Abdullah, for one, was consulted on his reactions to such
a move shortly after his return from a vacation in London
in early October. Soon afterwards, Chief Minister Mufti
Mohammad Sayeed went public with his belief that the Prime
Minister ought to negotiate directly with the APHC - an
idea he had pressed home to Vajpayee over the past several
months.
No one has yet offered a wholly plausible explanation of
the volte face in Indian policy this unexpected revival
of the peace process represents. On September 25, speaking
before the United Nations General Assembly in New York,
Vajpayee had made perhaps the most blunt official assertion
that no dialogue was possible unless Pakistan-backed terrorism
ended. "When cross-border terrorism stops", the Indian Prime
Minister had said, "or when we eradicate it, we can have
a dialogue with Pakistan on the other issues between us."
He seemed equally pessimistic on the prospects of a dialogue
with the APHC, saying it wanted "a special invitation, which
I cannot understand." The Union Government had already extended,
he pointed out, "a general invitation to all."
Evidently, understanding dawned on the Prime Minister sometime
in the two weeks after his New York visit, and the time
Farooq Abdullah was consulted on possible dialogue with
the APHC. Several explanations have been offered for this
sudden turn-around. Some observers believe there was intense
US pressure to give their Afghan war ally, General Pervez
Musharraf, some legitimacy-inducing concession on J&K. This
school of thought points to a dramatic reduction in fatalities
in J&K in October, which fell to a record low compared to
the same month in 2001 and 2002 - and, indeed, to a level
not seen since March this year. This can be interpreted
to be a partial fulfilment by Musharraf of India's 'no-terrorism'
precondition.
Advocates of the US-pressure thesis point to several other
pieces of evidence. On October 29, deposing before a House
Sub-Committee on International Relations, US Assistant Secretary
of State Christina Rocca singled out Musharraf for effusive
praise. "Despite sceptical public opinion and bitter criticism
from a coalition of opposition parties," she said, "President
Musharraf has maintained Pakistan's policy of supporting
US operations, with practical results."
Pakistan, Rocca proceeded, was doing what it could on Jammu
and Kashmir. "We look to Pakistan to do everything in its
power to prevent extremist groups operating from its soil
from crossing the Line of Control," she said. She then broke
with past US protestations, notably by Richard Armitage
just months ago, that Musharraf was not doing enough to
end cross-border terror "The Government of Pakistan has
taken many steps to curb infiltration [emphasis added],
but we are asking it to redouble its efforts." Rocca proceeded
to call for "dialogue and peaceful solutions to disagreements
in the region," including with "militants in Kashmir." Rocca's
use of the terms "militants" and not "terrorists" is instructive,
particularly since several of these figure on the US Government's
own list of foreign terrorist organisations.
The US pressure thesis, however, has little hard evidence
to support it.
Neither, sadly, does the other leading contender - Prime
Minister Vajpayee, this latter school of thought runs, is
deeply concerned with his place in history - or, cynics
contend, a Nobel Peace Prize - and genuinely wishes to push
ahead with a negotiated settlement. His policy thrust became
evident in the winter of 2000, just a year after India's
military triumph in the Kargil war. Hoping to strengthen
pro-dialogue elements within the Hizb-ul-Mujaheddin (HM)
led by dissident 'commander' Abdul Majid Dar, Vajpayee initiated
the five-month Ramzan Ceasefire. The ceasefire eventually
collapsed, but Planning Commission Chairman K.C. Pant was
appointed as the Union Government's first official interlocutor
to continue the dialogue process.
Pant formally invited the APHC to join the dialogue soon
after his appointment in April, 2001. It never responded
to the letter. Syed Ali Shah Geelani, then part of the APHC,
demanded that it be allowed to visit Pakistan as a precondition
to dialogue. Others, like Abdul Gani Lone, were more sympathetic
to the Pant mission, but could not carry the organisation
with them. Shabbir Shah, a secessionist leader outside the
APHC umbrella, also received a letter, and responded by
asking for several clarifications.
A desultory dialogue followed. N.N. Vohra replaced Pant
this year, and issued a press release inviting all interested
parties to dialogue. Maulana Abbas Ansari, soon after his
appointment as Chairman of the APHC, dismissed the invitation
out of hand, described Vohra as a "clerk" and demanded direct
dialogue with the Prime Minister. Vohra is known to have
met both Advani and Vajpayee in the days before the CCS
meeting, at which he was also present. Sources say the hard-nosed
bureaucrat made it clear that his mission had reached a
dead-end, and that any further progress would require the
Government to make larger concessions to the APHC centrists.
Despite Vohra's frustrations, however, the Government and
APHC had in fact remained in contact. Principal Secretary
to the Prime Minister Brajesh Mishra, and Officer on Special
Duty A.S. Dulat, are believed to have held a series of covert
meetings with top APHC figures. Former Union Minister Ram
Jethmalani, in turn, conducted a parallel dialogue process
through his own Kashmir Committee, which functioned as a
sounding-board for new ideas. When Vajpayee visited Srinagar
this April, his renewed calls for dialogue added impetus
to this quiet peace process.
The next month, Ansari revived the idea of visiting Pakistan,
much to the ire of the Islamists around Geelani, who felt
they would be kept out of such an initiative. Meanwhile,
the APHC itself split down the middle, and the Prime Minister's
Office came to believe it needed to make fresh concessions
in order to strengthen the centrists. During a meeting of
the Inter-States Council in August, Advani offered the APHC
an "informal dialogue" that bypassed Vohra. If the APHC
"desired to come to Delhi", Advani said, "the Centre would
have no objection to keep the door open for talks informally."
From here to the CCS offer was just a small step.
Despite the magical illusion of a 'dramatic breakthrough',
however, there appears to be no clear plan for transforming
dialogue with the APHC into a material reality. There is
still no agreement over the text of a formal official invitation
to the APHC, for one; the secessionists want some formulation
that acknowledges their demand for an independent Kashmir,
which New Delhi will be hard-pressed to provide. Neither
is there consensus within the Government, too, on the demands
by the mainstream APHC to visit Pakistan to hold a dialogue
with secessionist and terrorist groups based there.
Among the secessionist themselves, there is similar disarray.
Yasin Malik's faction of the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation
Front (JKLF)
opposed a two-way dialogue with India just this August,
while the breakaway parallel APHC formation, led by Islamist
hardliner Geelani, seems hostile to any repast commencing
on a table to which it has not been invited. Advani, for
his part, seems keen to circumscribe the limits of the dialogue
agenda. On October 24, he insisted that "the unity, integrity
and sovereignty of the country cannot be compromised," an
obvious reference to the APHC's demands that the secessionist
agenda be brought to the table. Instead, he suggested a
federal decentralisation of powers, as part of an all-India
process. On May 8, Vajpayee had suggested the prospect of
an "alternate arrangement" on Jammu and Kashmir, a term
that some read to imply a measure of dilution in India's
current structure of sovereignty.
As New Delhi steps ahead, then, it would do well to search
carefully for hidden mines. First, it is not negotiating
with the principals in the conflict. The APHC centrists
have little to give New Delhi in return for a deal - the
keepers of the jihad in J&K, after all, all reside
in Pakistan. The assassination of a senior APHC centrist;
a major terrorist attack; even an intemperate speech could
well sweep aside any gains of Delhi's recent initiatives.
The collapse of the peace process, with general elections
on the horizon, will strengthen those arguing for a limited
military response to any major terrorist aggression. Each
step towards peace, then, could actually end up bringing
India and Pakistan closer to war: we are, after all, inhabitants
of Wonderland.
|
Weekly Fatalities: Major Conflicts
in South Asia
November 3-9, 2003
  |
Civilian
|
Security
Force Personnel
|
Terrorist
|
Total
|
BANGLADESH
|
1
|
0
|
3
|
4
|
INDIA
|
Assam
|
6
|
0
|
6
|
12
|
Jammu
&
Kashmir
|
9
|
1
|
27
|
37
|
Left-wing
Extremism
|
1
|
0
|
1
|
2
|
Manipur
|
0
|
2
|
0
|
2
|
Nagaland
|
0
|
0
|
1
|
1
|
Tripura
|
0
|
0
|
2
|
2
|
Total (INDIA)
|
16
|
3
|
37
|
56
|
NEPAL
|
4
|
3
|
75
|
82
|
PAKISTAN
|
0
|
0
|
2
|
2
|
* Provisional
data compiled from English language media sources.
|
BANGLADESH
Most-wanted
terrorist
Abdul
Karim
Tunda
killed
in
gang-warfare
near
Dhaka:
One
of
India's
most
wanted
terrorist,
Abdul
Karim
Tunda,
was
reportedly
killed
in
the
Bangladeshi
capital
Dhaka
on
November
4,
2003.
Tunda,
who
was
a
native
of
Pilakhua
on
the
outskirts
of
Delhi,
was
reportedly
shot
dead
along
with
two
other
fugitives
in
an
incident
of
'gang
warfare'
at
Sherpur
near
Dhaka.
Tunda
is
known
to
have
trained
many
cadres
of
the
Lashkar-e-Toiba
(LeT)
network
in
India
and
has
been
on
the
most-wanted
fugitive
list
of
India
since
1994
in
connection
with
low-intensity
blasts
in
different
parts
of
the
country.
Hindustan
Times,
November
6,
2003.
PAKISTAN
Australia
designates
Lashkar-e-Toiba
as
a
terrorist
group:
The
Australian
Parliament
passed
a
bill
on
November
7,
2003,
to
outlaw
the
Pakistan-based
Lashkar-e-Toiba
(LeT).
According
to
reports,
the
move
to
designate
LeT
as
a
terrorist
outfit
came
after
allegations
that
a
French
terror
suspect
deported
to
Paris
in
October
2003
had
trained
with
the
group.
All
major
parties
in
the
Parliament
supported
the
bill
and
it
was
reportedly
passed
without
the
need
for
a
formal
vote
count.
Jang,
November
8,
2003.
SRI
LANKA
President
Kumaratunga
removes
three
Ministers
and
prorogues
Parliament:
President
Chandrika
Kumaratunga
on
November
4,
2003,
removed
the
portfolios
of
Defence,
Interior
and
Mass
Communication
from
Ministers
Tilak
Marapana,
John
Amaratunga
and
Imthiaz
Bakeer
Markar
and
also
prorogued
Parliament
until
November
19.
A
statement
from
the
Presidential
Secretariat
said
that
she
had
taken
the
decision
as
per
the
powers
vested
in
her
under
the
Constitution
of
the
Republic
of
Sri
Lanka.
The
press
release
said
"this
step
has
been
taken
after
careful
consideration,
in
order
to
prevent
further
deterioration
of
the
security
situation
in
the
country".
Claiming
that
the
decision
was
not
politically
motivated,
she
pledged
to
restore
security
of
the
country
and
also
continue
negotiations
aimed
at
a
peaceful
settlement
to
the
ethnic
problem.
The
President
on
November
5
also
declared
a
state
of
'short-term'
emergency
in
the
country
and
withdrew
the
same
on
November
7.
Government
Chief
Printer
Neville
Nanayakkara
said
the
President
had
ordered
him
not
to
release
the
gazetted
notification
imposing
the
emergency.
Daily
News,
November
8,
2003.
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