Sri Lanka To Create First Muslim Battalion
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The Peninsula of Qatar
By Feizal Samath
Posted: 3/28/2006
http://thepeninsulaqatar.com

Colombo: Sri Lanka is setting up its first Infantry Battalion made of only Muslims, the country's third largest community, to protect Muslim residents in the east from Tamil rebels, the first ever exclusive battalion for any community, the government said.

Military spokesman Brigadir Prasad Samarsinghe said interviews for recruitment to this battalion will start tomorrow, Tuesday, and held for seven days up to April 5 at the Army's Combat Training School in Ampara.

The battalion will protect the district of Ampara which has the largest concentration of Muslims in Sri Lanka and whose residents have often been under attack from Tamil guerrillas.

The spokesman said the command structure of the battalion which is normally made up of 500 soldiers is yet to be worked out.

Sri Lanka's military does normally recruit personnel on ethnic lines--until this latest move--but the armed forces are dominated by the Sinhalese, the country's majority community.

An announcement in yesterday's Sunday Observer in the form of an advertisement said new recruits should have a minimum qualification of having passed grade 8 in schools and be a Muslim living in the eastern province. They would be entitled to a salary package totalling 15, 000 rupees (US $150) in addition to travelling, medical benefits, food and accomodation.

Spokespersons for the militant Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelan (LTTE) were unavailable for comment but the new move is certain to be vociferously condemned by the Tigers who last month charged, at the first round of peace talks in Geneva with the Sri Lanka government, that the authorities were backing Muslim militant groups in the east.

The government has rejected the accusation. Relations between the two sides have soured since the peace talks with the LTTE accusing the government of going back on its word on the disarming of militant groups and the government accusing the Tigers of violating the cease fire on many occasions.