A breakaway Sri Lankan rebel leader, whose feuding with the Tamil Tigers is threatening a fragile ceasefire and is central to peace talks this week, said on Monday his group would only disarm if the main group does.President Mahinda Rajapakse vowed last week to rein in armed groups the LTTE says are attacking them, but V. Muralitharan, alias Col. Karuna, who split with the LTTE in 2004, told Reuters his group would resume attacks if provoked.“If Sri Lanka forces disarm all the armed groups and us .it will only give legitimacy for the LTTE to extend its writ to kill us,” Karuna said in an E-mail interview before verifying his identity by telephone.“Any handover of arms must be part of a conflict resolution process at a stage when normalcy and trust is established,” he added. “It is important that LTTE too must hand over its weapons at the same time under international supervision.” — Reuters
