Britain offers to talk with Sri Lanka Tamil Tigers

COLOMBO, Feb 15 (Reuters) Britain today offered to play a bigger role in Sri Lanka's moribund peace process, including talking directly to Tamil Tiger rebels it has outlawed as terrorists, as part of efforts to end a two-decade civil war.

Wrapping up a three-day visit to assess the impact of renewed war on thousands of displaced families in the island's restive east, a senior British envoy said Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse had given the green light to the idea of talks.

''We'd be delighted to become more involved in helping to facilitate the peace process,'' British Foreign Office Minister Kim Howells told reporters.

''We asked the president a very specific question. We said how do you feel about a situation where we might talk to the LTTE and he said: 'As long as it's part of the peace-building process, we have no objections to that.''' Norway is the lead peace mediator in Sri Lanka, but has been repeatedly criticised by Rajapakse's hardline Marxist and Buddhist monk allies.

The Sri Lankan government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) have been embroiled for months in a new chapter of a war that has killed more than 67,000 people since 1983, and which analysts fear is set to escalate.

Apparently emboldened by the capture of a key eastern Tiger stronghold, the government has vowed to wipe out the Tigers' entire military machine, worrying diplomats who want both sides to respect a now tattered 2002 ceasefire pact.

The Tigers resumed their fight for an independent state after Rajapakse flatly rejected their demands for a separate homeland for minority Tamils in the north and east.

Suspected Tigers have mounted a series of ambushes and bomb attacks in recent months and truce monitors and rights groups have accused both sides of repeated rights abuses and truce violations.

The rebels have shunned government offers of renewed peace talks, but analysts say Rajapakse and the military appear keen to settle the conflict on the battlefield rather than at the peace table.

''We only speak to terrorist organisations if it's part of that peace building process,'' Howells said. ''We certainly are prepared to engage in conversation with representatives of the LTTE if those conversations are part of the peace process, which we believe will lead to peace.'' Britain, the United States and a host of European nations are cracking down on Tamil Tiger fund-raising and arms procurement.

''We certainly want to squeeze their ability to buy guns and explosives to murder Sri Lankans,'' Howells said.

Before his visit, Howells said Britain's experience in Northern Ireland was proof that conflict is not the way to achieve peace, and said Sri Lanka's international reputation would be tarnished if the war continued.

Reuters SSC RN2240