New Delhi: A Tamil ally in the Sri Lankan Government today (Oct 30, 2004) attacked the LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam) for making the demand for Interim Self Governing Authority (ISGA) and asked it to immediately return to the negotiating table, saying any further delay in doing so would be a "betrayal" of Tamils.

"For no plausible reason, the LTTE has kept away from the negotiating table even as the Government is committed to substantial devolution of powers and for the first time in the history of Sri Lanka, all major parties have come forward to find a solution," said K N Douglas Devananda, secretary general of the Eelam People's Democratic Party said in New Delhi.

Addressing a Conference on India's Sri Lanka Policy, Devananda, who is Minister of Agricultural Marketing Development, Co-operative Development and Hindu Affairs, said, the LTTE should clinch this opportunity to find a lasting, political solution to the Tamil problem.

"But the LTTE has so far shown no intent for a final solution. It is guilty of intransigence and has delayed proceedings by making the ISGA demand," he said.

Claiming that the Tamil people were not demanding ISGA, the Minister also accused the LTTE of crushing political pluralism and democracy in the Tamil-dominated North and East of the country by carrying out political assassinations during the now 32-month-old ceasefire and indulging in rigging in the last Parliamentary elections.

Devananda said the international community, especially India, has a role to play in making LTTE "see reason."

"We do not expect the peace process to be a cakewalk and the international community, especially India, need to make LTTE see reason," he said.

Noting that India and Sri Lanka are bound by geographical, historical, cultural, religious and linguistic ties, he said this is what compelled India to send the peacekeeping force to the island nation in the 80's.

"We call upon India to play a positive role in solving the problem and help find a lasting solution," Devananda said.

Addressing the meeting, editor-in-chief of Hindu N Ram noted that India has gone on record stating that the LTTE's demand for ISGA was not acceptable to it, as it wants any interim administrative arrangement to be part of the final political solution.

He said India could play the "bulwark" role in the peace process "without repeating the mistakes of the earlier attempt."

Former director of CBI (Central Bureau of Investigation) D R Karthikeyan said the solution to the vexed problem lay in appropriate devolution of powers and international funding for reconstruction and rehabilitation.

Karthikeyan, who headed the investigation in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case, also urged for studying the root cause of the problem. "We need to study what gave birth to this insurgency and led to its growth."