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Report on sinking of Chinese trawler biased: Chandrika

By V. S. Sambandan

COLOMBO APRIL 8. The Sri Lankan President, Chandrika Kumaratunga, has criticised the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) for a "completely unsatisfactory and biased" report on the recent sinking of a Chinese trawler off the island's eastern shores.

In letters to the head of the SLMM, a team of Nordic truce monitors and the Navy Commander, Ms. Kumaratunga said the SLMM "had not conducted a full and impartial inquiry" and faulted its "attempt to equate" the Government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. The monitors, had "failed even to mention some of the evidence which apparently goes against the LTTE", the Presidential secretariat said in a statement.

The President, who is on a four-day "working visit" to India, also said that "there is much evidence to raise suspicion against the LTTE" regarding the attack on a Chinese trawler. The trawler, Fu Yuan Ya 225, was sunk 17 nautical miles off the eastern Mullaittivu coast on March 20. Both the LTTE and the Navy have denied their involvement in the sinking of the trawler that was reportedly operating under a Sri Lankan permit.

The SLMM had observed that it had "not found any proof" that either party "is responsible for the attack". Moreover, with both denying involvement, the SLMM said, "the attackers must be criminal elements operating on their own" and had called upon both the parties to take steps to "find, disarm and arrest such elements".

The SLMM's finding, already under criticism within Sri Lanka, gained a more serious note with today's presidential statement. Over the past year, the SLMM has been caught often in Sri Lanka's bitter political bickering. While the south had blamed it for "bias towards the LTTE", it was blamed by the rebels for "adopting a militaristic approach" on the sensitive issue of the northern high security zones after it observed that there could be "no unilateral reduction of the military balance" thereby shooting down a crucial rebel argument for withdrawal of troops from the northern Jaffna peninsula.

Apart from "the conclusion" by the SLMM that the attack was not carried out by the LTTE or the Government, but by some other "unidentified armed elements", the Presidential statement also termed "unacceptable" the SLMM "pointing a finger at other armed Tamil groups without any evidence". In a statement last week, the SLMM said it "wants to state very clearly that it is not pointing at specific political parties or groups known to the Government or the LTTE at this time".

Making the point that there was no knowledge of "any criminal elements or pirates operating in the Sri Lankan seas for many centuries", the Presidential statement said: "The recommendation that the Government and the LTTE should monitor the seas of Sri Lanka to prevent similar incidents would startle anyone who has the slightest knowledge of the law. The attempt to equate the LTTE with the Government, which is a sovereign state, implies that the LTTE has already set up a sovereign state".

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