Don’t politicise tsunami aid, warns Sri Lanka Tamil leader

KILINOCHCHI, Sri Lanka, (AFP) - Tamil Tiger rebels asked Sri Lanka Sunday not to "politicise" tsunami relief, but said working with Colombo to distribute foreign aid could help build confidence among the warring parties.









KILINOCHCHI, Sri Lanka, (AFP) - Tamil Tiger rebels asked Sri Lanka Sunday not to "politicise" tsunami relief, but said working with Colombo to distribute foreign aid could help build confidence among the warring parties. The rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) said they invited Colombo to jointly distribute relief to survivors of the December 26 tsunami but regretted that six months later the government has still taken no action.

"It is purely for the administration of post-tsunami aid.

If they try to introduce politics or politicise it, we are afraid the mechanism will get disrupted," Thamilselvan said in an interview with AFP.

"What we have proposed is only a mechanism to share the aid that has been flowing into the country," he said at the LTTE's peace secretariat in the rebel-held town of Kilinochchi, 330 kilometres (260 miles) north of Colombo.

He said the proposed joint mechanism, which President Chandrika Kumaratunga has backed publicly, was not a part of the Norwegian-b