Anyone raising issues of Lankan Tamils seen as LTTE sympathiser: ex-minister

Sri Lanka's lone Tamil woman minister who resigned last week, has alleged that anyone raising issues of the minority Tamil community is branded as an LTTE sympathiser, days after her controversial remarks seeking revival of the separatist militant outfit led to an uproar in Parliament and forced her to step down.

Vijeyakala Maheswaran, 45, was the state minister of child affairs from the northern Tamil region representing the ruling United National Party (UNP) led by Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe.

Maheswaran resigned following her remarks at a public gathering in Jaffna on Monday where she had said that due to the deteriorating law and order situation and rising crime, people in the northern province were wishing for the LTTE's revival and return.

The premier had sought an inquiry into her comments that led to an uproar in Parliament as well as in the Sinhala-majority south. UNP leaders had also demanded her sacking.

Maheswaran later stepped down following talks with her party leader Wickremesinghe.

Her speech has now been referred to the attorney general to probe if she had violated the Constitution by publicly promoting the separatist cause of the LTTE.

She has claimed that she was quoted out of context.

In her first public reaction since her resignation, Maheswaran told a meeting in the north yesterday that when you talk of the problems of the Tamil people, the south looks at you as Tigers (LTTE). I will fight to deliver justice to the people despite opposition to my efforts. I resigned my post for the sake of the people.

The LTTE had run an armed movement for a separate Tamil homeland in the northern and eastern provinces of the island nation for nearly 30 years before its defeat in 2009 by the Sri Lankan army.

Maheswaran said the present condition of Sri Lankan Tamils was still better than during the rule of former president Mahinda Rajapaksa under whose tenure the LTTE was crushed.