Think tanks for closer India-Lanka maritime cooperation

New Delhi, Dec 17 (UNI) Experts from India and Sri Lanka have called for closer maritime cooperation between the two countries and asked the various parties to exercise wisdom and maturity in bringing an end to the ethnic strife in the Island nation.

This message came out loud and clear at a recent seminar organised by the Observer Research Foundation here where think tanks from the two countries made out a case for closer engagement and stressed the need for widening co-operation in the sphere of maritime security.

The seminar was entitled 'India- Sri Lanka Maritime Co-operation; Opportunities and Challenges.' The experts, led by former Defence Minister K C Pant, noted that there was a period after independence when Lanka's economy registered robust growth rate. Even now. many of its social indicators were the best in South Asia.

They said but for the ethnic strife in the last few decades, Lanka would have been able to achieve a much higher growth rate as well as all-round regionally-balanced development.

Noting that complexity and ambiguity were the hallmarks of today's security environment, especially in the maritime sphere, they said terrorism has significantly increased the nature of non-military, trans-national, and asymmetric threats in maritime sector. But unlike traditional military scenarios involving combat operations at sea, in which adversaries and theatres of action were clearly defined, these non-military threats often demand responses that were more flexible and unorthodox.

''Having been exposed to the complexities of the ethnic strife in Sri Lanka as Defence Minister in the later half of the 1980's, when the IPKF was there, I realise that great wisdom would be required to overcome years of distrust and bloodshed,'' Mr Pant, who was Deputy Chairman Planning Commision in the NDA regime, said.

The experts hoped the agreement between the Government and the main opposition party will give a strong impetus to the process of finding a solution which can satisfy the aspirations of the Tamils within a united Lanka. This, they said, appeared to be the objective of the MOU between the two parties and the report of the expert committee.

The experts said they would welcome an early resolution of this conflict without further bloodshed and suffering.

The argument for a closer engagement was weaved into several factors-- close neighbours, a shared common destiny, the two countries are bound to each other by culture, religion and history.

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