BBC News
By Charles Haviland
Sri Lanka’s president has addressed a crowd of his supporters on a rare visit to the northern city of Jaffna, which was once held by the Tamil Tigers.
As reported in the BBC by Charles Haviland: Mahinda Rajapaksa said that development was his priority rather than political reforms. Rajapaksa was re-elected in January, eight months after the Tamil Tigers defeat. The city in which he visited Jaffna had been made the capital by Tamli Tigers by a breakaway Tamil-ruled statelet for five years in the early 1990s. The president reached out to the crowd speaking mostly in Tamil and declared, “That from now on there would be no racial division in Sri Lanka.” Haviland from the BBC reports that some local people told the BBC that they appreciated the normality of life now that the government had won the civil war. Others said that Tamils faced special problems which had to be addressed. According to the BBC although Rajapaksa’s support seems thin in the north, most predict that his government will easily win next week’s election.Read Full Story Here
