Sri Lankan President calls all-party meeting on national reconciliation of minority Tamil community on Jul 26

The development closely follows the president's two-day official visit to India last week, where he met Prime Minister Narendra Modi

Colombo: Sri Lankan President Ranil Wickremesinghe will convene an all-party meeting on Wednesday on the National Reconciliation Programme that seeks to address the thorny issue of ethnic reconciliation of minority Tamils in the island nation, an official statement said on Monday, days after his visit to India.

“An all-party conference, led by President @RW_UNP, is set to take place at the Presidential Secretariat on July 26 to inform party leaders representing @ParliamentLK about the National Reconciliation Programme,” a statement released by the President’s Media Division said.

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“Invitations have been extended to leaders of all political parties and independent groups with representation in parliament,” it added.

The development closely follows the president’s two-day official visit to India last week, where he met Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Tamils issue figured prominently in the wide-ranging talks between the two leaders. The Indian prime minister highlighted the need for the implementation of the 13th Amendment (13A) to the Sri Lankan Constitution.

India has been pressing Sri Lanka to implement the 13A, brought in after the Indo-Sri Lankan agreement of 1987. The 13A provides for the devolution of power to the Tamil community.

It created nine provinces as devolved units with a temporary merger of the Northern and Eastern provinces.

Full implementation of the 13A to Sri Lanka’s Constitution will facilitate unity among all the communities in the island nation so that they live as one.

Prior to his India visit, at a meeting with the Tamil parties, Wickremesinghe assured that the 13th Amendment would be fully implemented, without police powers, in the provincial councils.

Prime Minister Modi, during his talks with Wickremesinghe, expressed hope that the Sri Lankan leader would be committed to implementing the 13A and holding the provincial council elections. He urged Wickremesinghe to ensure a life of respect and dignity for the Tamils.

Sri Lanka has had a long history of failed negotiations to end the Tamil claim of discrimination by allowing some form of political autonomy.

The Tamils put forward their demand for autonomy after gaining independence from Britain in 1948, which from the mid-70s turned into a bloody armed conflict.

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) ran a military campaign for a separate Tamil homeland in the Northern and Eastern provinces of the island nation for nearly 30 years before its collapse in 2009 after the Sri Lankan Army killed its supreme leader Velupillai Prabhakaran.

According to Sri Lankan government figures, over 20,000 people are missing due to various conflicts, including the three-decade brutal war with Lankan Tamils in the north and east, which claimed at least 100,000 lives.