Killing may push Lanka back towards war

Lakshman Kadirgamar, a vociferous critic of the Tamil Tiger movement, was shot dead outside his home late Friday, prompting the government to clamp a state of emergency on the Indian Ocean island nation.

Sunanda Deshapriya, director of the Colombo-based Centre for Policy Alternatives, said he feared a Norwegian-brokered between the government and the rebels that has been in place since February 2002 could collapse.

Deshapriya said pressure needed to be placed on the government and rebels to preserve peace on the island where tension between the two sides has been escalating in recent months.

"There should be both local and international pressure on the parties to hold the course, build confidence and maintain the ceasefire," he told AFP. "Otherwise, there's a chance we will go back to war."

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, who have been waging a campaign for a separate homeland for the minority Tamil community for over 30 years, were the prime suspects for the killing, military spokesman Daya Ratnayake said.

But the rebels, who have previously called ethnic Tamil Kadirgamar a traitor to their cause, denied involvement in the assassination and suggested elements in the government could be responsible.

UN Secretary General Kofi Annan led international concern for the troubled peace process, saying he hoped the killing would not weaken resolve to end the conflict between the Singhalese majority and the Tamils.

Norwegian peace envoy Erik Solheim said the assassination complicated the already difficult task of trying to engineer a lasting peace deal in a country where over 60,000 people have been killed in three decades of conflict.

"It's completely insane, it's a major setback for the peace process," Solheim told AFP in Oslo. "The identity (of the assassin) is not clear, but it is evident that suspicion will fall first on the Tamil Tigers."

An Asian diplomat said the government could now ask Western nations to mount pressure on the Tigers to uphold the ceasefire and pursue the peace process.