Shimali Senanayake,  Mon Feb 27 11:48:24 EST 2006

    CELIGNY, Switzerland – The government and the LTTE clinched a better than expected deal last week to continue talking and vowed to put an end to violence in talks that were to decide if Sri Lanka was heading for peace or war.

However, the agreement, brokered by Norway, was reached only after the talks came to the brink of collapse more than once, with both parties sticking to their guns and threatening to walk out of their first meeting in three years.

The two-day crunch talks weren’t expected to churn out much results anyway and most felt if the parties could at least agree to continue the dialogue the meeting would be deemed a success. This was precisely what even Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera said in a meeting with diplomats in Colombo, days ahead of the talks.
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- The Academic

Was there anything achieved in the Geneva talks?  I don't believe it!


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H.U.MAN




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This journalist is known to sensationalise simple news items into something exciting. As she doesn't work for any news agencies now, she seems to write news items and highlight minute issues into something big.

In addition another sentence states,

Quote:

“We cannot accept such exaggerated figures as authentic acts of ceasefire violations,” Balasingham, told an attentive government team."

Well, according to Sunday Times few people were sleeping in the meeting and one needed to be woken up.

Only thing came out of Geneva is to extend the current CFA for another two months and both parties ensuring that they will stick to the CFA rules.

Some of these comments on the report are too negative in tone.

Senanayake, it seems to me, has given us a detailed and comprehensive report.

Mr Balasingham and the Govt. team should be congratulated on what they have done. But of course it is not enough.

What remains to be done cannot be achieved easily. Making peace is much much more difficult and time consuming than making war.

There is another agreement now, at least on paper. Let's hope the parties concerned will try to honor it and return to the table for further discussions as promised.

The report also contans the following intriguing statement: "Thamilselvan subsequently said that Ashraff was speaking as if she were the mother of the children and he was speaking as if he were the father, ...."

Does this mean that both of them have the same goals for the children or that they have different vested interests in them?

Mothers and fathers are not necessarily aware of what is best for their children. "Parental", "traditional" prejudices and pressures on their offspring are among the reasons for many problems Sri Lankans face today.

Did they ask the children? What do they have to say?