<b>India says division of Sri Lanka not acceptable, calls for peaceful talks with rebels</b>

DILIP GANGULY, Associated Press Writer

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka - India threw new weight behind the peace process in Sri Lanka on Friday by saying its neighbor should not be divided along ethnic lines.

India's new External Affairs Minister Yashwant Sinha, on his first official foreign trip since being appointed on July 1, met Sri Lankan leaders this week to discuss the prospects of peace talks with the Liberation Tigers of Tamileelam.

The rebels have fought since 1983 for a separate homeland for Sri Lanka's 3.2 million Tamils, saying they must be independent of the 14 million Sinhalese on the island, once known as Ceylon.

The Sri Lankan government signed a Feb. 22 cease-fire with the Tamil Tigers.

Both sides have accused the other of truce violations. However, a momentum for peace continues.

A statement issued by India's High Commission in Colombo said New Delhi was committed "to the unity, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Sri Lanka."

It said India also wanted "the restoration of lasting peace through a peaceful negotiated settlement that meets the just aspirations of all elements of Sri Lankan society."

Colombo has long worried about India's policy toward its civil conflict.

Indian security forces trained the Tamil Tiger rebels when the movement began two decades ago. India is also home to millions of ethnic Tamils, including some rebel supporters.

In the 1980s, New Delhi sent troops to Sri Lanka, but they failed to enforce a cease-fire.

In 1991, a Tamil Tiger suicide bomber killed former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi .

India regards the Tamil Tiger rebels as a terrorists and has charged the guerrilla leader, Velupillai Prabhakaran, with murder for allegedly plotting the Gandhi's assassination.

The Sri Lankan government has also outlawed the group. But it is considering lifting their terrorist status as a way of bringing about peace talks, now slated for August in Thailand.

The Tamil Tigers are also banned as terrorists in the United States, Australia, Britain and Canada.

In India on Thursday, police in the southern state of Tamil Nadu arrested a politician, who goes by the single name of Vaiko, and eight other men, after he delivered a speech supporting the Tamil Tigers' fight.

Police also detained nearly 3,000 members of Vaiko's political party, which is part of a coalition government under Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.

The government, which pushed through a tough anti-terrorism law through Parliament in March, did not comment on the arrests and detentions.

Tamil Nadu's chief minister on Friday demanded Vaiko's party be banned as a terrorist organization under the new law.

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