Sri Lanka Swears in New President
19/11/2005| IslamWeb
Mahinda Rajapakse, the hardliner who won Friday's presidential election in Sri Lanka, has been sworn into office in the capital, Colombo.
Rajapakse, a former prime minister, won just over 50% of the vote against his main rival, Ranil Wickramasinghe.
Election officials rejected calls by Wickramasinghe's camp for the poll to be re-run in areas controlled by Tamil Tiger rebels who boycotted the vote.
Rajapakse has vowed to take a tough stance in any talks with the rebels.
He said after his victory that he would pursue an "honourable peace".
He also warned he was ready to review a ceasefire with the rebels and would never give in to their demands for total autonomy for the island's minority Tamil population.
"We must have law and order in a single country," he said.
Peace fears
Erik Solheim, a Norwegian politician who has tried to mediate between the government and the rebels, said he feared for the stalled peace process.
"The situation is now very difficult," Solheim told NRK public radio.
"There may be a danger that Sri Lanka can slide further into uncontrolled violence in considerable parts of the country," he said.
Solheim said the Tamil rebels' calls to boycott the polls could indicate their rejection of the political process.
Turnout was put at 75% in the south and west, but almost no Tamils voted in some minority Tamil areas.
Rajapakse was sworn in by Sri Lanka's top judge, Sarath Silva, at a ceremony overlooking the Indian Ocean on Saturday.
He is later expected to name a prime minister and new cabinet.
At the end of counting, Rajapakse had secured more than 4.8 million votes, about 180,000 ahead of Wickramasinghe. There were 11 other candidates.
Rebel warning
Rajapakse is a populist whose heartland is the countryside in the Sinhala-Buddhist-dominated south.
In pre-poll deals with Marxist and Buddhist parties he pledged a hard line in peace talks, including a renegotiation of the ceasefire agreement.
The Tamil Tigers warned Rajapakse not to use his victory to adopt "military means to occupy our land or wage a conflict".
SP Thamilselvan, a leader of the Tigers' political wing, told the BBC such actions would have "negative implications for the other side and we hope that they will understand the reality”.
Tamils make up about 20% of Sri Lanka's 19-million population.
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