SL Opposition Ready for TNA in Parliamentary Committee

Sri Lanka's main opposition United National Party (UNP) is ready to persuade the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) to join the parliamentary select committee (PSC) if the government implements the LLRC recommendations to achieve reconciliation.

UNP General Secretary Tissa Attanayake was responding to a government comment that UNP must bring the TNA into PSC.

"The government must initiate confidence building measures to take opposition into confidence. The UNP is ever willing to act for the welfare and security of the country and that of the people," Attanayake said.

Attanayake said government action to draw up a plan in consultation with the opposition to implement the recommendations of the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC) could be a good starting point.

"If the government draws up the plan to implement the LLRC the opposition can cooperate", Attanayake said.

President Mahinda Rajapaksa proposed the setting up of a PSC to hammer out a solution to the island's ethnic impasse with the Tamil minority.

However the main Tamil party, TNA appears reluctant to take part in the process claiming the move was a stalling tactic. Instead the TNA wants bilateral talks between them and the government to provide the framework for the final solution which could be taken up at the PSC deliberations.

Rajapaksa would rather have the PSC as a tool to arrive at the final solution. The Sri Lankan president thinks PSC the ideal inclusive process of all stake holders in order to resolve the problem.