Word: ltte
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...civilians has become an international human rights issue. On Dec. 16, the European Union proposed suspending a major trade agreement with Sri Lanka, mainly due to the continued detention of IDPs. But Sri Lankan authorities have justified the camps as a security measure, allowing them to screen out suspected LTTE fighters hiding among the civilian population. Fonseka says he would have handled the process more effectively and warns of the consequences of failing to identify lurking LTTE cadres. "If there is a single terrorist act, the army will have to again start searching these people, putting up roadblocks, checkpoints, raiding...
...soldier. He joined the Army at the age of 19, and he will turn 59 on Dec. 18, the day his campaign officially begins. The same year that Fonseka joined the Army, Rajapaksa won his first election to Parliament. A shrewd, brash career politician, Rajapaksa made eliminating the LTTE, an armed separatist group, the all-consuming mission of his four years in office. Since the collapse of the Tigers, Colombo has been full of enormous cut-outs of the president, congratulating him on his victory. Rajapaksa called early elections to capitalize on the post-war euphoria. (See pictures from deep...
Fonseka's base of support cuts right into Rajapaksa's. Both are from the increasingly vocal bourgeoisie of the rural south, the heartland of Sri Lanka's Sinhala Buddhist majority. The LTTE's Tamil nationalism and its dream of a separate homeland for the Tamil minority were a challenge to Sinhala Buddhist dominance. Fonseka has the reputation of being an even more strident Sinhala nationalist than Rajapaksa but is now trying to soften that image. "I am a very good Sinhalese, a very good Buddhist, there is no question about it," he says. "But towards minorities I never...
...still considers the LTTE a threat. "Even in Colombo there are [still] about 20 LTTE suicide cadres," he says. "They are waiting for the leadership, the guidance, the orders from top." But burnishing his security acumen and resting on his military accomplishments might not be enough to assure Fonseka an electoral victory. Many Sri Lankan voters have moved on to more immediate concern - steeply rising inflation and jobs threatened by a deep global recession and a downturn in major export earners including tea and the garment industry. Fonseka had little to say about economic policy other than to promise "development...
Politics have unraveled the Fonseka-Rajapaksa alliance. In his interview with TIME, Fonseka repeated charges, first published in a Sri Lankan newspaper, the Sunday Leader, that Gotabaya Rajapaksa had given orders that top LTTE commanders not be allowed to surrender. "This is well known to all those who were there in the field," Fonseka said. "[The Defenwe Secretary] was supposed to have said, 'Whether anybody comes with white flags or no, finish off everybody.' I was the Army Commander, they never passed that message to me, never even consulted me. I only came to know this after two days after...