Top most on the agenda of the new government should be the prevention of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal falling into Taliban’s hands. This is not an alarmist speculation. Leon Panetta, the CIA Director, recently confessed that, “We don’t have, frankly, the intelligence to know where they all are located. It is something that we continue to watch.’’ Any possibility of Taliban having access to nuclear weapons in Pakistan should be firmly, nay ruthlessly, scotched because the implications of that event are too frightening to contemplate.

Tamil cause lives on

LTTE forces have been vanquished by the Sri Lankan Army and its chief Prabhakaran is dead. The Tamil cause, however, remains alive. If the legitimate aspirations of the Tamils in Sri Lanka are not fulfilled, the deadly seeds of conflict that Prabhakaran implanted, will continue to simmer. The Sri Lankan Tamil minority will draw inspiration from Prabhakaran as a hero and a martyr and there will be more Prabhakarans in the future. President Rajapaksa should at the earliest initiate a political process that is fully inclusive and which effectively ensures equal political, economic and civil rights for the country’s Tamil minority as Sri Lankan citizens. This is essential for securing a lasting peace and for resolving the ethnic conflict which has long plagued this peaceful island.

India is uniquely placed to play a constructive role in effectuating a just settlement and must strive its utmost to do so. That is the legitimate expectation of the Tamil community in Sri Lanka and the vast majority of Tamilians in India.

... contd.