JVP in underhand tactics to delay APRC report

Feels report will avert military onslaught against Tigers

By Munza Mushtaq
The Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) is resorting to underhand tactics to delay the much hyped but now delayed All Party Representative Committee (APRC) report.

The Bottom Line reliably learns that the JVP has been pressuring President Mahinda Rajapaksa to delay the releasing of the Committee’s main report. The thinking of the JVP is that the international community will pressurise the government to cease all military activities against the LTTE and press for political solution as soon as the report is out.

A source said that the JVP had been campaigning for the dissolution of the Committee or the delaying of the crucial report.

Sources said that the APRC had been continuing its deliberations this week.

“The Committee’s primary duty, which is still incomplete, is to present a solution to the country’s burning ethnic conflict,” sources said.

Although the Committee had nearly finalised its main report by early last week, which they were to hand over to President Rajapaksa, along with the other report which advices how to implement the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, last minute arguments between the representatives of the Mahajana Eksath Peramuna and the Jathika Hela Urumaya, both government allies, had prevented the Committee from wrapping up its sessions, leading to the unnecessary delay.

“It looks like the government allies are being used to delay the report,” sources charged.

However, a JHU member denied the allegations saying that they had raised genuine issues during the meeting.

Meanwhile, President Rajapaksa is scheduled to present the APRC recommendations on how to implement the 13th Amendment, for cabinet approval, today. “The President was initially hoping to submit the report for cabinet ratification on January 23 itself, the day he received the report from the APRC, but he was unable to do so because the Sinhala and Tamil translations of the document were unavailable,” a government minister said.