Colombo, Aug 20: Claiming that Tamil Tiger suicide squads had infiltrated the capital and were planning to kill President Chandrika Kumaratunga, her spokesman today said she would break up the island's embattled north-eastern province, in a move to take away a key concession to the rebels. "They (rebels) have carried out surveillance and we have very credible information that they are now planning to assassinate the president," Kumaratunga's spokesman Harim Peiris told reporters here. Peiris said she was "actively considering" the de-linking the eastern province and the northern province from the present combined north-eastern province. He said the Muslims in the multi-ethnic eastern region did not want to be dominated by the Tamil-majority north.
The two regions, which together account for about a third of the island's land mass, were united into a single entity in 1987 under the Indo-Sri Lanka peace accord as a concession to Tamils. Although the accord was not fully implemented, the merger remains in force.


Peiris declined to say when and how Kumaratunga would carry out the de-merger of the north-eastern province.

The remarks came as the tiger rebels prepared to hold a key meeting in Paris to formulate a response to the government's latest offer of an interim administration in the island's north-east.

Twelve tiger rebels left here today to attend a closed-door internal meet with their legal experts starting tomorrow in the French capital and likely to continue for a week.


Bureau Report