Rajapaksa rules out north-east re-merger

Rajapaksa-Express Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa on Tuesday ruled out the re-merger of the Northern and Eastern provinces to form a single Tamil-speaking province.

Explaining this to editors N Vithiyatharan of Sudar Oli and Devaraj of Virakesari at a breakfast meeting with the heads of media institutions here, Rajapaksa said the merger of the two provinces had been a demand of the LTTE and there was no question of entertaining it now.

Rajapaksa said that he had to keep in mind the interest of the Muslims, who, he said, were in a majority in the Eastern Province, and who, as such, would not be happy to be merged with the Tamil-majority. The two provinces, which were united following the India-Sri Lankan Accord of 1987, were de-merged by a Supreme Court decision based on technical grounds in 2006.

In a bid to attract the votes of the Tamils of the North and East, Rajapaksa said one of the reasons for holding the presidential election two years ahead of schedule, is to give the Tamils of the North and East a chance to vote, as the LTTE had prevented them from voting in the last election held in 2005.

[Full Coverage]

(For updates you can share with your friends, follow TNN on Facebook and Twitter )