US travel advice dismissed

--BBC--

By Charles Haviland BBC News, Colombo

	Minister says US travel advisory is "totally baseless"

The Sri Lankan government has dismissed a travel advisory issued by the United States warning its citizens about possible dangers in visiting the country.

Sri Lanka says some Tamil Tiger rebels were still at large but that they posed no threat.

Speaking to journalists the defence spokesman, Keheliya Rambukwella, described the US travel advisory, issued last Friday, as “totally baseless” and said the foreign secretary had written a very strong letter in response.

The warning from Washington said that despite the government’s announcement of victory in its war, the island remained vulnerable to attacks from Tamil Tiger remnants, even renewed insurgency.

Arrested LTTE members

It said there were landmines and armed paramilitaries in the east and north and said the Sri Lankan government was encouraging its people to report foreigners if they found their activities suspect.

The people who have really got involved in destruction, active participation in terrorist activities, would be dealt in accordance with the law of the land Minister Rambukwella on arrested LTTE members

Asked about continuing media reports of LTTE operatives being arrested, and sometimes killed, Mr Rambukwella said there were still “quite a few” at large but not in numbers to cause alarm.

He said a hard core of former LTTE who had surrendered or been captured would be treated strictly.

"The people who have really got involved in destruction, active participation in terrorist activities, would be dealt in accordance with the law of the land," he said.

But a greater number of former rebels, he said, would be rehabilitated as they might have been associated with the group against their will; some could be viewed as innocent victims, he said.

The government is still detaining more than a quarter of a million war-displaced Tamils in camps and screening them for possible LTTE links.