US embassy cable - 04COLOMBO1705

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 COLOMBO 001705 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR SA 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/13/2014 
TAGS: PGOV, PREL, PTER, CE, LTTE - Peace Process, Political Parties 
SUBJECT: TRYING TO MOVE THE PEACE PROCESS FORWARD: 
AMBASSADOR'S MEETING WITH PRESIDENT KUMARATUNGA 
 
Classified By: AMB. JEFFREY J. LUNSTEAD.  REASON:  1.4 (B,D). 
 
SUMMARY 
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1. (C) Ambassador met President Kumaratunga one-on-one 
October 13.  The President was grateful for US support on the 
peace process.  She believes renewed efforts to curtail Tiger 
funding would be valuable.  She suggested the US might want 
to talk to the Tigers directly to make sure they get our 
message.  She thinks the UNP might still join her National 
Advisory Council on Peace and Reconciliation.  She thinks she 
has the JVP under control.  END SUMMARY 
 
UNGA Events 
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2. (C) I called on President Kumaratunga evening of October 
13. Kumaratunga bustled into the meeting room shortly after 
7:00 for our 6:00 appointment. (Since the Cabinet meets 
Wednesdays at 7:00, this meant she was now keeping them 
waiting.) The visibly-tired President apologized for being 
late, then launched into a description of her time in New 
York at the UNGA.  She mentioned that she had been seated 
along with President Bush at Secretary General Annan's table 
at his dinner, but had been unable, because of the setting, 
to exchange more than a few pleasantries.  She said she had 
also had a chance to speak briefly to Secretary Powell at the 
President's reception, and at more length to U/S Grossman and 
A/S Rocca. 
 
3. (C) Kumaratunga continued that she was sure Foreign 
Minister Kadirgamar had told me about his meeting in 
Washington with Deputy Secretary Armitage, which had gone 
well.  She said that she was especially pleased with the 
statement which the Department had issued after that meeting. 
 
 
How to Tame the Tigers? 
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4. (C) I told her that I had met the Deputy Secretary when I 
was in DC in August, and that our interest in seeing progress 
in Sri Lanka remained steady, as shown in our statements. 
The question, I said, was how to move things forward.  It was 
especially hard to find ways to leverage the Tigers.  The 
Tigers were coming under increasing pressure now, as many of 
the Europeans, who had earlier taken a softer line, were now 
being much more tough with the Tigers as a result of the 
continuing Tiger murders of their opponents.  The Tigers were 
hearing this, I told her, during their current European tour. 
 We were looking at additional ways to motivate them, 
including through contacts with their expatriate advisers, 
and in seeing if there were additional ways to cut off their 
outside funding.  Kumaratunga thought these were both 
excellent ideas, especially working on their funding.  They 
have no state sponsor, she said; they depend entirely on 
outside funding. 
 
5. (C) I told Kumaratunga that we continued to try to send a 
two-fold message to the Tigers.  The first part was that 
their behavior was unacceptable and had to change, and that 
until it changed there could be no change in the designation 
of the LTTE as a terrorist organization.  The second part was 
that if their behavior did change, our attitude could also 
change.  I said that we tried to see that the Tigers received 
this message, but that we had no direct contact with them, as 
a matter of policy. Kumaratunga spontaneously interjected: 
"Why don't you send one of your people to see Tamilchelvan 
while he is Europe?" I told her this was an interesting idea, 
but that such a meeting could be easily misinterpreted.  She 
said she understood that, but added that in her experience 
the Tigers were very good at keeping confidences. 
 
Government Efforts 
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6.  (C) I then asked Kumaratunga how things were going from 
the Government side.  What did she think had resulted from 
her convening of the National Advisory Council on Peace and 
Reconciliation on October 4?  She replied that she thought 
the inaugural National Advisory Council (NAC) meeting had 
gone well.  She was, of course, disappointed that the Tamil 
National Alliance and the UNP had not participated.  She had 
heard, however, that there was considerable feeling in UNP 
ranks that UNP leader Ranil Wickremasinghe had made a mistake 
in not attending.  The NAC would now break into three smaller 
groups--political, religious and civil society--and hold 
meetings at that level.  She would send invitations to all 
the parties to participate in the political sub-group.  I 
told her that we also had the impression that many people 
felt the UNP had erred in not attending the NAC, and hoped 
that she could allow Wickremasinghe a face-saving way to opt 
back in, if he wished to do so.  She said that the exchanges 
between herself and Wickremasinghe on this subject had so far 
been cordial, and that she would try to keep it that way.  I 
encouraged her to do so.  I told her we would encourage 
Wickremasinghe and the UNP to be supportive of the peace 
process. (I will see UNP Deputy Leader Karu Jayasuriya on 
Monday and make this point.) 
 
7. (C) On the question of resuming talks, Kumaratunga said 
that she believed she had made a significant gesture to the 
LTTE in her opening statement at the NAC, when she said that 
her government accepted the necessity to set up an Interim 
Administration, but would require a commitment from the LTTE 
that the Interim Administration as well as any final 
settlement would be based on the Oslo Declaration which said 
that a federal solution should be sought within a united Sri 
Lanka.  She did not see why the LTTE could not agree to this 
as they had signed on to Oslo already. She added that she had 
received word from the Norwegians that in the recent LTTE 
meeting with Vidar Helgesen, Tamilchelvan had indicated the 
LTTE might be able to show some flexibility on the agenda for 
the talks--perhaps a result of the hard message they were 
receiving from the Europeans. 
 
8. (C) What about the JVP, I asked the President?  Could she 
get them to go along with her ideas?  She said that she 
believed the NAC offered the JVP a face-saving way to go 
along with negotiations.  The issue of peace had been the 
most difficult when the SLFP was negotiating its alliance 
with the JVP last year.  The SLFP wanted to accept 
federalism; the JVP was only able to go as far as 
power-sharing at the local level.  They had papered over this 
difference when the JVP accepted a formulation that they 
would accept whatever received the backing of the majority of 
Sri Lankans.  She was sure she could persuade the majority to 
support a federal solution.  Now that they are in government, 
she said, the JVP are beginning to realize the need for 
compromise. 
 
9. (C) I told the President that we supported her efforts to 
resume the peace talks, and that we, and the rest of the 
international community, had always been clear that any 
solution must not harm the unity and territorial integrity of 
Sri Lanka.  She should keep that in mind, I said, because it 
was a type of support which could allow her to take some bold 
steps.  She responded that she greatly appreciated our 
support. 
 
COMMENT 
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10. (C) The President said she was still jet-lagged from her 
trip to the US, waking up at 2 or 3 in the morning,  and was 
visibly fatigued--with a several-hour Cabinet meeting still 
to come. She is clearly still hunting for that so-far elusive 
formula which will allow the peace talks to restart, while 
not appearing to give in totally to the Tiger demands.  As 
noted above, we will continue to talk to the UNP and urge 
them to support the process.  We agree with the President 
that working on curtailing the Tigers, overseas funding is a 
good idea.  We will explore this at greater length in an 
additional message. 
LUNSTEAD