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Sri Lankan peace 'complacency'

<img src='http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/40148000/jpg/_40148377_vidarbody.jpg' border='0' alt='user posted image'>
Mr Helgesen said "low intensity war" could resume.

A Norwegian mediator in Sri Lanka has complained of complacency in the peace process and says the situation is the most serious in more than two years.
Norwegian deputy foreign minister Vidar Helgesen said he found "people tend to take peace for granted".

He was speaking after the latest setback to a resumption of peace talks, stalled since April 2003.

Mr Helgesen met Tamil Tiger leaders and the president this week but there was no agreement to restart talks.

Priority

Mr Helgesen said many Sri Lankans had forgotten the ceasefire in operation since February 2002 was only a freezing of war and not an end to the conflict.

He said it seemed this frozen war was now melting at the edges.

The Tigers and government cannot agree on talks resumption

Mr Helgesen was referring to the escalation in violence in recent weeks that has seen a number of killings, including eight people shot dead on Sunday and a suicide bombing in the capital earlier this month.

The BBC's Frances Harrison in Colombo says this latest visit by the Norwegians to Sri Lanka has not resulted in any move to restart stalled peace talks.

The priority has been saving the ceasefire.

Mr Helgesen said the current situation was very risky and could result in low intensity war if the killings continued.

But he said what worried him most was the sense of complacency and lack of urgency about the situation.

Both sides, he said, needed to understand there was no middle ground between a military solution and pursuing a peace process.

His comments came after he travelled to the north of the island to meet rebel representative SP Thamilselvan and then briefed President Chandrika Kumaratunga.

Mrs Kumaratunga had said on Tuesday she was keen to restart talks.

She said her government would resume negotiations on an interim authority within a united state, as sought by the Tamil Tigers.

She had previously said negotiations could only begin on the basis of a permanent solution.

However, Mr Helgesen said the Tigers could not agree on the proposed agenda for a resumption of talks.

A continuing row over breakaway rebel leader Colonel Karuna is also a major sticking point, observers say. The Tigers accuse the army of helping him - something the military denies.

The Tigers left peace talks in April last year saying the government had failed to honour pledges in their stronghold in the north and east.

bbc.com