Sri Lanka has refused requests by Norwegian peace mediators to visit rebel territory, and said fresh peace talks hinged on Tamil Tiger guarantees to lay down arms and stick to a negotiation timetable. Nordic ceasefire monitors quit the country this year after the six-year Norway-brokered truce disintegrated. Earlier this week, Seewaratnam Puleedevan, secretary-general of the rebels' Peace Secretariat, said he wanted to meet directly with peace facilitators. However, the government said the team headed by Norway's Special Peace Envoy John Hansen Baur, would, for now, not be allowed to visit the rebels' northern stronghold. "We don't want – Mr. Baur coming up, so that they can take photograph of him and say 'Mr. Baur has come to see the terrible sufferings inflicted on Tamil people of the Tamil Ealam'. It can't be propaganda," Rajiva Wijesinghe, the secretary general of the Secretariat for Coordinating the Peace Process (SCOPP), told Reuters on late Wednesday. "Baur had wanted to go. But we have told him, we want a very clear idea of why you are going. It would mean a commitment of the LTTE and what for they want Baur to come and talk about." The government said it would only reconsider restarting the dead peace process when the rebels agreed to a clear road map to ending the 25-year civil war. Meanwhile, the military said on Thursday they were closing in on rebel leader Velupillai Prabhakaran. "The Security Forces are attacking Mullaittiuvu, Prabhakaran's hideout, from several directions. The army's aim is to capture Prabhakaran, who is holed up in a bunker, alive," army commander Lt. Gen. Sarath Fonseka said. "Prabhakaran is believed to be living in an underground bunker in the area. Forces have already regained several hundred square kilometers where the Tigers held sway and they have to march forward another 21 miles to achieve the final goals." Government forces, meanwhile, destroyed two rebel bunkers in Sri Lanka's embattled north while infantry clashes killed 13 rebels and two soldiers, the military said Thursday. The latest round of infantry clashes broke out Wednesday along the front lines bordering the rebels' de facto state, a defense ministry statement said.
