Sri Lanka Tamil party calls for reduction in military in the North and East

Sri Lanka's major Tamil political party, the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) has once again called for the reduction in military presence in the North and East. TNA Leader R. Sampanthan says
there needed to be a reduction in the military presence in the North and East. Sampanthan has told a Tamil media that the current ratio of security personnel in the North and East stood at one soldier for every eight civilians. He has said there was no necessity for military personnel to be involved in civilian activities like temple festivals and school functions. According to Sampanthan, the security forces in the North and East posed an obstacle to the smooth functioning of the civil administration in those areas. The TNA leader's comments had been made in response to a statement made by President Mahinda Rajapaksa on Saturday during the third anniversary celebrations of war victory that security forces would not be withdrawn from the North and East until the LTTE threat from overseas Tamil diaspora exists.