US leads move to halt Lanka's slide to war

A US State Department official left here Tuesday, urging the government and Tamil Tiger rebels to resume talks suspended in April 2003 and stop violence that has claimed over 200 lives since early April.

But a day after the visit three policemen were killed in two landmine attacks while a civilian was shot dead in the northeast, the military said.

"The trend lines are discouraging in terms of the increasing provocations by the LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam), the fact that killings are increasing," US Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for South and Central Asian Affairs Donald Camp said at the end of his two-day visit.

"All of these suggest Sri Lanka is not on the way back to a lasting ceasefire," he said.

Sri Lanka, meanwhile, came on for criticism from Amnesty International for a spate of killings.

"Regardless of who is responsible for the attacks, the Sri Lankan government has obligations under international law to take steps to prevent such killings," the London-based rights watchdog said.

Camp's talks came before a crucial meeting May 30 in Tokyo of Sri Lanka's key international financial backers.

The US, Japan, the European Union and Norway co-chaired a meeting in June 2003 to raise 4.5 billion dollars in international aid pledges in support of the island's peace efforts.

But much of the aid was tied to progress in the Norwegian-backed and internationally supported peace initiative, which hit snags by mid-2003.

He said Washington had also "encouraged" the 25-member European Union to ban the Tigers and cut off their international funding.

The US banned the LTTE in 1997, five years after India outlawed the LTTE after accusing it of involvement in the assassination of former Indian premier Rajiv Gandhi.

At least three policemen were killed in mine attacks in Sri Lanka yesterday while unidentified gunmen shot dead a Tamil civilian, military officials said.