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India can help: Lanka minister

India can bring the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam to the negotiating table, Sri Lankan Minister for Fisheries Mahinda Rajapaksa said in Dehradun, Uttar Pradesh.

"I hope India will co-operate with us. Most people of Sri Lanka feel that India can settle this problem forever by bringing the LTTE to the table," Rajapaska, who is in Uttar Pradesh for the inauguration of a post-graduate diploma course in human rights at the Rural Litigation and Entitlement Kendra, open for SAARC countries, told reporters last evening.

On why he felt India should intervene, he said India is a superpower in the region and "we believe the LTTE will listen to it".

"India is closest to us and we hope it will come to our help," Rajapaska said.

He said President Chandrika Kumaratunga had expressed disappointment at India's refusal to give her government military assistance in the war against the Tigers.

The minister, who will deliver a lecture on 'Voluntary Disappearances' today, said the Kendra's initiative to make the human rights course open to students from SAARC countries deserved great appreciation.

"We have seen that conflicts arising out of human rights violations travel across borders. They become problems for neighbouring countries," he said, citing terrorism in Kashmir and ethnic violence in Sri Lanka.

UNI

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