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Sri Lankan multi-ethnic panel meet today

B. Muralidhar Reddy

COLOMBO: Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse on Tuesday morning would preside over the first meeting of the 15-member multi-ethnic committee to advise him on power sharing in the Tamil dominated north and east.

The committee, initially consisting of 12 members and later expanded, was announced a day after the visit of Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran and India's call for "special efforts" to halt the spiralling violence and revive political dialogue on devolution of powers.

Mr. Rajapakse is projecting the constitution of the committee as a first major step towards evolving consensus on devolution of powers to redress grievances of various ethnic communities particularly the Tamils.

Representatives of all political parties and the diplomatic corps have been invited to the official residence of Mr. Rajapakse to witness the proceedings. Expectations are that he would outline his vision on the tasks before the committee. Indications are the main Opposition party, United National Party (UNP), would stay away from the event.

UNP upset

The party is upset with Mr. Rajapakse for inducting four of its rebels into his Government and feels that he is not sincere in his endeavour to find a solution based on consensus.

Even critics of Mr. Rajapakse concede that it is for the first time any Government has appointed an experts committee with a fair representation of Tamils and Muslims. But they are sceptical of its outcome.

"Sri Lanka has been down this road so many times in terms of parliamentary committees and what not. Unless there is change of heart nothing tangible can be expected and there are no indications yet of such a development," a Tamil politician opposed to Tamil Tigers said on condition of anonymity.

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