Monks said Satyagraha will offer 'courage' to Rajapaksa who described Cease Fire Agreement as a 'mistake'

National Bhikku Front (NBF) staged a Satyagraha in the capital, Colombo, urging President Mahinda Rajapaksa to abrogate the Norwegian mediated Cease Fire Agreement (CFA).

LTTE leader Velupillai Prabhakaran and the then Prime minister, Ranil Wickramasinghe, were signatories to February 2002 CFA.

CFA 'a mistake'

In an exclusive interview with BBC's Roland Buerk last week, President Rajapaksa described the agreement as a 'mistake'.

The protesting monks said they were happy Rajapaksa admitted CFA was a mistake.

The aim of the Satyagraha is to bless Rajapaksa to correct the 'mistake', NBF advisor Prof. Attangane Rathanapala thero told BBC's Elmo Fernando.

Vakamulle Uditha thero, media secretary of the NBF, expressed hope that Rajapaksa would positively respond to their demand.

Escalated violence

Rajapaksa pledged to 'revise fully' the CFA, if elected, in an electoral pact with the Sinhala nationalist Peoples Liberation Front (JVP).

Violence escalated since his election in November 2005, as Tamil Tigers are accused of killing hundreds of security force personnel in claymore bomb attacks.

The government responded with air attacks after suicide bomb blast that targetted Army Commander and LTTE closed a sluice gate in the east.

Over three thousand were killed and over 200,000 displaced as a result of escalated violence that followed.

Since then the security forces have captured two LTTE-strongholds in the east.

Both the government as well as the LTTE have violated the truce in many occasions, according to international truce monitors.