Sri Lanka's president offered to share power with minority Tamils Friday, nearly two years after his troops put down a separatist war by ethnic Tamil Tiger rebels. President Mahinda Rajapakse told foreign correspondents at his tightly guarded Temple Trees residence in Colombo that he was open to devolving power to address the long-standing grievances of ethnic Tamils.
"I am ready to share power at the centre," Rajapakse said. "It is better than sharing power at the periphery. I have already asked Tamil political parties to forge unity and come up with a negotiating position." Rajapakse, whose security forces crushed the Tamil Tiger rebels in a no-holds-barred offensive that ended in May 2009, said he will not allow separatist to re-emerge, but he wanted to address minority issues. He said he was prepared to improve on a 1987 plan to devolve more political power to the island's north and the east where Tamils are concentrated in a nation whose ethnic Sinhalese form the majority.
The 1987 plan, which envisaged regional autonomy for local councils with powers to run their own administrations, is incorporated in the constitution as the 13th amendment, but it has not been fully implemented. "I am prepared for '13 plus'," the president said, referring to his willingness to improve on the devolution provisions of the 13th amendment to the constitution. He wanted Tamils to have greater representation at the national parliament as well as in a proposed upper house.
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