Lanka blocks Norweigian envoy's meeting with LTTE

Colombo, Apr 23: The Sri Lankan government today asked a top Norwegian envoy in the island nation's capital of Colombo not to proceed with his visit to the LTTE-held Wanni to hold talks with rebel leaders citing security reasons, diplomatic sources said.

''Our Ambassador, Hans Brattskar, was scheduled to visit Kilinochchi for talks with the LTTE's political wing leaders.

But last night, the Sri Lankan government told us not to proceed with the visit due to security reasons,'' Norwegian Embassy spokesman, Eric Nurnberg told sources by phone.

He said it was not immediately known when the proposed meeting with the LTTE and the Norwegian Ambassador would take place ''as it all depends on the governnent's hand''.

As the facilitator, the Norwegian Ambassador held a routine meeting with government's chief negotiator Minister Nimal Sripala de Silva last week and discussed the current peace-related situation in the civil war-ravaged island nation.

It was after this meeting that Mr Brattskar decided to hold a parley with the Tamil Tiger rebels.

The government and the LTTE held negotiation talks in October last year in Geneva, but the talks ended in failure with both the parties taking an uncompromising stand on various peace-related issues.

This has resulted in both the government troops and the LTTE cadres engaging in pitched battles, which has left over 4000 people killed and over 20,0000 becoming war refugees in their own areas in the north-east region since December last year.

UNI