The Hindu : Front Page : Government firm in checking LTTE activities, says Karunanidhi

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Tuesday, Feb 05, 2008
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Government firm in checking LTTE activities, says Karunanidhi

Special Correspondent

Chief Minister refutes charge that the organisation has “free run in State”

In the last 20 months,12 cases registered
11 LTTE volunteers, 92 supporters arrested

CHENNAI: Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi on Monday asserted that the State Government was firm in preventing Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam activities in the State.

Refuting the charge that the LTTE was given a “free run in the State,” the Chief Minister quoting figures said in the last 20 months12 cases had been registered, 11 LTTE volunteers and 92 supporters arrested.

Of them, 40 had been booked under the National Security Act. These actions clearly proved that the charge against the Government was baseless.

Reacting to Congress MLA C. Gnanasekaran’s demand in the Assembly that the intelligence wing should be strengthened, Mr. Karunanidhi said the fact that many LTTE activists had been arrested in the last two years was a testimony to the Government’s firm action.

It was surprising that Mr. Gnanasekaran who congratulated the Q branch police for arresting LTTE volunteers was unaware that the Q branch was working under the intelligence wing.

In a statement, Tamil Nadu Congress Committee president M. Krishnasswamy on Monday clarified that none of the speakers at a meeting organised by the party in Nagercoil had said that the State had become a hunting ground for the LTTE or that the Chief Minister was soft in handling the LTTE activities.

Even in his recent letter to the Chief Minister he had only asked the Chief Minister to take action against those who were organising meetings in the State in support of the LTTE and ridiculing the Congress for its stand on the LTTE.

Sethu project

Replying to Pattali Makkal Katchi founder S. Ramadoss’ demand that the Sethusamudram project be implemented at any cost irrespective of the alignment, the Chief Minister said that earlier he himself had expressed the same view. But officials had said that it was not possible to change the alignment now as 60 per cent of the work had already been completed.

The Chief Minister said the present alignment was selected after studying all the six possible alignments in the last 50 years.

Nobody objected to the alignment when the surveys were conducted or when the work was started.

Opposing the alignment now, stating that it would damage ‘Ramar Sethu’ was nothing but a “conspiracy” to stall the project, he said.

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