NEW DELHI, Jan 5 (KUNA) — Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse has expressed confidence that his government will be successful in defeating Tamil insurgency by the end of 2008 and stated that development programmes have been launched in areas recaptured from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). “The Sri Lankan government has been able to develop the areas which were earlier controlled by the LTTE and establish peace there,” President Rajapkase said while launching a chapter of; Nenasala Economic Development Project’ in the country’s eastern province of Sammanthurai Friday, news agency Press Trust of India reported Saturday. He said his government would try to defeat terrorism by end of this year.
The President said there was a group of people in Sri Lanka who had been deprived of the benefits of the development programmes but he would assure justice to all. Meanwhile, Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama has ruled out an immediate ban on the LTTE and said that the government was ready for talks with the outfit if it came to the negotiating table after surrendering arms.
However, Sri Lanka’s Defence Secretary and President’s brother Gotabhaya Rajapaksa and political party — Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) have called for the need to ban LTTE. The government has already withdrawn itself from the 2002-ceasefire pact with the LTTE, which was brokered by Norway.