Vaiko warns India on another Kashmir in South

Chennai, Aug 22: Marumalarchi DMK (MDMK) General Secretary Vaiko, a staunch supporter of the outlawed Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), has warned India of 'creation of Kashmir in the south', if the Tamils in Sri Lanka suffered and failed to get 'Tamil Eelam'.

'Don't create a Kashmir in the South', Mr Vaiko said at a public meeting here last night, organised to pay homage to 61 school children 'massacred' by Sri Lankan armed forces in Mullaitivu.

Asserting that Tamil Eelam was the only solution to the Tamils' problem in the island, the MDMK leader said India should not offer any military assistance to the Sri Lankan government, which would be utilised only to kill the Tamils.

'Do not create a Kashmir like situation in the south by giving military assistance to Sri Lanka, which will be turned against the Tamils,' he said, adding, 'we will not go for violence, but youths are susceptible to extremism.' 'If India were to assist Sri Lanka in any way, that could uproot the Tamils and in such an eventuality, an impression will be created in the minds of youths that India is assisting Sri Lanka and acting against the interest of the Tamils'.

'This might force the youth to take to militancy and we will become irrelevant. We should not give room for the creation of a Kashmir-like situation in the south,' he warned, adding, he had told Prime Minister Manmohan Singh this when he met him recently to stop India having any defence pact with Sri Lanka.

In his fiery speech, Mr Vaiko thundered that Eelam was the only solution and the MDMK would always support the LTTE. ''I said this yesterday. I am saying it today and I will say it tomorrow also,'' he said and asserted that he was even willing to be imprisoned for the sake of Tamils in Lanka. Justifying the remarks made by MDMK South Chennai district Secretary Manimaran, who was arrested by the state government for his speech that ''we are prepared to take AK-47 rifles in our hands to espouse the cause of Eelam Tamils,'' Mr Vaiko dared the state government to arrest him and not his partymen.

He said the MDMK would stage a demonstration in front of the Sri Lnakan High Commission in New Delhi on August 30 and another protest rally on September one in Chennai to condemn the killing of Lankan Tamils and to urge India to intervene, to stop the killing of innocent Tamils as a major war was on in that country.

UNI