Sri Lanka-Tamil Pact Reported Close to Signing

Sri Lanka’s government and Tamil rebels are close to signing an India-mediated peace accord to stop the four-year-old ethnic insurgency that has killed 6,000 people, officials said Friday.

Velupillai Prabhakaran, chief of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, flew from Sri Lanka to Madras, India, on Friday en route to meetings with Indian officials in New Delhi, said Gopalaswami Parthasarthy, spokesman for India’s Foreign Ministry.

“This is part of our ongoing efforts to find an early, peaceful, political solution to the ethnic issue,” Parthasarthy told reporters.

Sri Lanka state radio reported Friday evening that the government will sign two agreements--one with India and the other with Tamil separatists--on Wednesday in Colombo, the island nation’s capital.

Jyothindra Nath Dixit, India’s high commissioner in Colombo, left for New Delhi on Friday, taking with him the draft peace accord for Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi’s approval, the radio added.

A Sri Lankan government communique said Prabhakaran, the chief Tamil rebel leader, was expected to sign the peace plan during his visit to New Delhi.

New Proposals

“We have been in touch with the Sri Lankan government and new proposals have emerged which go beyond the earlier ones,” Parthasarthy said.

Parthasarthy, however, declined to reveal details of any agreements with the rebels or with Sri Lankan President Junius R. Jayewardene’s government.

He also would not say whether Gandhi would visit Colombo in the next few days, as reported by Sri Lankan officials.

Tamils make up 18% of Sri Lanka’s 16 million people. Tamils, most of whom are Hindus, charge that they are discriminated against by the majority Buddhist Sinhalese in the use of their language, jobs and education.

India reportedly has agreed to be a guarantor to the latest agreements.

News reports say the plan grants some autonomy to the northern and eastern provinces of Sri Lanka, where most Tamils live, and calls for the creation of a single provincial council. That would fall short of previous Tamil demands for a separate nation.

The plan reportedly calls for a referendum on the merger of the two provinces a year later.

Tamils would also be recognized as a separate community and Tamil would be accepted as an official language, according to reports.

Officials in Colombo, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the peace plan calls for a 24-hour cease-fire during the signing.