`India should balance interests of Tamils, its security`

India should strike a "balance" between its efforts to secure rights of Tamils and protect its own security interests in Sri Lanka by preventing Pakistan and China from getting a "foothold" in Colombo, a senior Tamil politician from the island nation said here.

Pakistan and China wooed Mahinda Rajapakse government with defence cooperation offers to fight LTTE, requiring India to strike a balance, Tharmalingam Sitharthan, heading the Peoples Liberation of Tamil Eelam (PLOTE), said today.

"If India feels Pakistan and China should be kept out of Sri Lanka, New Delhi should have a degree of defence cooperation to ensure island's own security," he said.

Sitharthan, a former militant-turned-politician opposed to the LTTE, was on a fortnight-long tour to India along with Anandasangaree, President of Tamil United Liberation Front and T Sritharam of Eelam People's Revolutionary Liberation Front, to drum up support for moderate Tamil parties in Sri Lanka.

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http://www.zeenews.com/articles.asp?rep=2&aid=416652&sid=NAT

Nato secrets USB stick lost in Swedish library

The discovery of a USB memory stick containing classified NATO information in a library in Stockholm has prompted a meeting between the Swedish Military Intelligence and Security Service and foreign defence officials.

The Swedish Military Intelligence and Security Service is a division of the Swedish Armed Forces Central Command responsible for Sweden's military intelligence.

According to Swedish daily Aftonbladet, the stick contained material on NATO's ISAF peace-keeping force in Afghanistan, as well as an intelligence report on the attempted assassination of Lebanon's defense minister and the murder of Sri Lanka's foreign minister.

Colonel Bengt Sandström of the Swedish Military Intelligence and Security Service says this kind of carelessness is intolerable and can result in up to six months in prison.

It is unclear how the USB stick ended up in the library.

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http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/01/04/another_stick_with_

PM’s Colombo visit dates not yet finalised

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will not participate in the 60th Independence Day celebrations of Sri Lanka on February 4, the island nation’s Foreign Minister, Rohitha Bogollagama, said here on Friday.

Mr. Bogollagama clarified that though Sri Lanka had extended an invitation to Dr. Singh, the dates of his visit are yet to be worked out.

The disclosure that the dates of Dr. Singh’s visit to the island nation have not yet been finalised was made a day after the Foreign Minister called the Indian High Commissioner Alok Prasad to inform him about the decision of Colombo to abrogate the 2002 Cease Fire Agreement.

According to sources in the Sri Lanka Foreign Office, Mr. Prasad reportedly told the Minister that New Delhi was concerned about the current situation in the island nation and would like to see faster progress on a political package for the resolution of the ethnic conflict.

A few weeks ago, the Minister told Parliament that Sri Lanka had invited Dr. Singh to be the chief guest of the function on February 4 marking the 60th Independence Day.

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http://www.hindu.com/2008/01/05/stories/2008010556481200.htm

Sri Lanka not looking at February for Indian PM's visit

Sri Lanka said Friday that it was not expecting Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to visit the country in February, to be the chief guest at the 6oth independence day celebrations.

'We are not looking at February or any other specific date for the Indian prime minister's visit. What we would like is a bilateral visit by the Indian prime minister in the course of 2008. No Indian prime minister has paid a bilateral visit to Sri Lanka in the last 20 years,' Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama told the media here.

Asked if any other date had been fixed if Manmohan Singh was not likely to be in Colombo Feb 4, the country's independence day, the minister said it was for India to come up with dates.

According to diplomatic sources, the Sri Lankan government had invited Singh to be the chief guest at the Feb 4 independence day celebrations. But the Indian government had not taken a decision in the matter.

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http://www.indiaenews.com/srilanka/20080104/89687.htm

Vaiko urges Manmohan Singh not to visit Colombo

MDMK General Secretary Vaiko has urged Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh not to visit Colombo to participate in Sri Lanka's Independence Day celebrations, saying that it would send a "wrong signal" in favour of the Mahinda Rajapakse government which was using military might to resolve the ethnic conflict.

Vaiko, a staunch LTTE supporter, appealed Dr. Singh not to accept the invitation extended by Sri Lankan President Rajapakse for attending the National Day celebrations on February 4.

He cited the report of UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour, who after a visit to Colombo indicted the Sri Lankan military for gross human rights violation.

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http://www.indiavision.in/article/National/8695/

Is a ban on LTTE Lanka’s next step?

Sri Lanka’s decision to call off the February 2002 ceasefire with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) is at one level a logical move as the truce was only on paper.

In the last two years and more both sides have used air power and artillery in what is virtually a full-fledged war between the two sides.

Yet Wednesday’s move signals the growing confidence of President Mahinda Rajapaksa and the defence establishment in Colombo that the military has gained the upper hand. The next step could be a ban on the LTTE.

The President’s brother defence secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa had already given a hint in an interview to the government-controlled Daily News last week.

He said the government should officially withdraw from the ceasefire and ban the LTTE for a fresh approach to the Tamil question. The ceasefire agreement brokered by Norway had become a joke in the eyes of the people, he added.

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http://www.dnaindia.com/report.asp?newsid=1143105