Meeting the Buddhist leadership

The chief Norwegian peace negotiator expects to restart negotiations to bring back the Sri Lankan government and the Tamil Tigers after the presidential election in Sri Lanka .

Speaking to BBC Sinhala service 'Sandeshaya' soon after his appointment, Erik Solheim said, "after the elections there is a chance of serious progress in the peace process regardless of who is elected".

	Norwegian negotiator with SL Prime minister

Election campaigns

While the ruling party presidential candidate Mahinda Rajapaksa's campaign for a "Unitary Sri Lanka" rejects sharing power with the Tamil Tigers, his foremost challenger Ranil Wickramasinghe's election manifesto calls for a solution based on "agreement arrived at between the Government and the LTTE and the Oslo and Tokyo declaration".

The Sri Lankan government and the Tamil Tigers agreed in the Oslo round of peace talks in December 2002 to "explore a political solution founded on internal self-determination based on a federal structure within a united Sri Lanka".

After the elections there is a chance of serious progress in the peace process regardless of who is elected Erik Solheim

Solheim helped broker a February 2002 cease-fire between the Sri Lankan government and Tamil Tigers that paved the way to six rounds of peace talks that ended in a stalemate in March 2003 after talks in Hakone, Japan.

Since the breakdown in talks and the breakaway of the Tamil Tigers Eastern commander Karuna a year after, the ceasefire has been heavily threatened with killings, mainly in the East.

"Direct involvement"

The Norwegian minister was optimistic that the government of Sri Lanka and the LTTE can be brought back to the negotiation table after the elections to be held on November 17.

"I definitely expect to be directly involved in the peace process of Sri lanka" he added.

The coalition (known as the Red-Green coalition) of the Labour, Socialist Left and Center parties won a majority in the Norwegian Parliament in last month's election, promising to increase spending on welfare and to put up taxes.