South Africa Joins Sri Lanka Conflict Resolution Conference

South Africa is to attend an international conference aimed at ending the conflict between the Sri Lankan government and the rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).

Representing the South African government, Deputy Minister of Communications Roy Padayachie will address the two-day International Seminar on Ethnic Conflict, taking place in London on Saturday.

"The South African Government has consistently sought to encourage and lend support to the creation of a climate conducive to a finding a lasting solution to the Sri Lankan conflict.

"Our effort at this international gathering will once again call upon the leadership of all of Sri Lanka's diverse people to recommit to a ceasefire and to use all possible endeavours to return to the negotiating table.

"We mourn the loss of life as a result of the intensification of violence and we will make every effort to share our experiences in the peaceful settlement of conflicts, reconciliation and nation building that we have learnt from our own transition process from apartheid to democracy with the Sri Lankan people.

"We have been consistently urged by the South African Tamil groups and organisations and the broader South African public to play a role in support of Sri Lanka's return to peaceful reconciliation and development," Mr Padayachie said.

The seminar will contribute to the growing world opinion urging Sri Lankans to observe the 2002 ceasefire and return to the negotiating table to seek a lasting solution to the conflict emanating from the LTTE's struggle for the creation of an independent state.

The seminar will also focus on discussing effective mechanisms that will tackle the issues of racial and ethnic discrimination and ways in which these could be addressed through inclusive constitutional development.

The conference is being organised by the Global Peace Support Group, a charity organisation based in the United Kingdom.

According to the Department of Communications, the conference will mobilise politicians and ministers, jurists and other eminent scholars and dignitaries from Sri Lanka, Australia, India, Malaysia, Sweden, Netherlands, Germany, Denmark, United States of America, Norway, United Kingdom and South Africa.

South Africa is internationally hailed for stepping out of the apartheid era into democracy without a civil war.

In terms of conflict resolution on the continent, South Africa has engaged in various support and peacekeeping operations in 12 countries.

These countries include Uganda, Burundi, the Comoros, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Somalia, Rwanda, Eritrea/Ethiopia, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Sudan and Cote d'Ivoire.

At a Post-Cabinet briefing on Thursday, Government spokesperson Themba Maseko announced Cabinet has approved the deployment of South African National Defence Force (SANDF) members to northern Uganda as part of an African Union (AU) mission there.

Mr Maseko highlighted that the east African country has been plagued by violence in one of the continent's longest-running conflicts.

This has been perpetrated largely by a group of rebels, the Lord's Resistance Army, who have been accused of committing widespread and gross human rights violations utilising thousands of child soldiers. -

Source: allafrica.com