Colombo paper wants Indian minister fired

Colombo paper wants Indian minister fired

COLOMBO (AFP): Indian Defense Minister George Fernandes was
accused on Monday of supporting Sri Lanka's Tamil Tiger rebels by
a state-run daily which called for his dismissal from the
caretaker government.

The evening Observer newspaper said Sri Lanka's Liberation
Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) guerrillas may be unhappy over
Saturday's fall of the Indian government in which their
sympathizer was the defense minister.

The Observer also lambasted the outgoing government of Prime
Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee who lost a confidence vote by one
ballot in the Indian parliament on Saturday.

The nuclear test explosions and firing of the intermediate
range ballistic missile known as Agni were described by the
Observer newspaper as "high visibility stunts" to win popularity.

There has been no formal reaction from Colombo to the fall of
the Vajpayee government, but the state-run newspaper slammed
India's Fernandes and said the Sri Lankan government had
apprehensions about his appointment as defense minister because
of his pro-LTTE stance and accommodation to the rebels.

The newspaper pointed out that Fernandes had hosted a pro-LTTE
meeting at his New Delhi home because the meeting could not take
place publicly as the rebel group was declared a banned
organization there.

The political crisis in India came to a head following
Fernandes's sacking in December of the Indian navy chief Admiral
Vishnu Bhagwat.
The sacking created an uproar and set off a bitter war of words
in the Indian media between Bhagwat and Fernandes.

The Indian government's refusal to reinstate Bhagwat or
censure Fernandes was one of the main reasons for the defection
of a key coalition partner that left Vajpayee's administration in
a minority and led to its collapse Saturday.

"If reports are to be believed, there is no doubt that the
Indian defense minister could be faulted for compromising India's
security concerns....

"We may well see George Fernandes being divested of the
defense portfolio even at this belated stage," The Observer said
in an editorial headlined: "Agni backfires, Prabha sweats."

Sri Lanka's Tamil Tiger movement is led by elusive Velupillai
Prabhakaran who is also wanted in India for the 1991
assassination of former Indian premier Rajiv Gandhi.