This request was made by Colonel Karuna, who is a Special Military Commander of the LTTE, and is a member of the LTTE's delegation for talks with the Sri Lankan government, in an interview to the Tamil daily Thinakural in Zurich on Wednesday.

Karuna said that while it was normal for one country to provide military assistance to another country, India should avoid giving such aid to Sri Lanka at this juncture when a peace process was on and India itself was supporting the process. "In this matter India should be cautious," he said.

"Military assistance should not be extended to other situations," Karuna said. Apparently, he meant that India should stop giving such aid if war were to break out. "It will lead to a grave situation," he warned. He appealed to the Sri Lankan government to be mindful of this.

Karuna was responding to reports on Tuesday that a 12 member Indian delegation, comprising officers from the Army, Navy and the Air Force, was on a five day visit to Sri Lanka's military establishments to study ways and means of enhancing the training of Sri Lankan personnel.

The Island daily had quoted Sri Lankan military sources to say that the visit was "very significant", but Indian official sources said that it was routine, had been fixed long ago, and formed part of a long standing training programme.

Sugarcoating the warning to India, Karuna said that Indians were cautious and would not precipitate a crisis. He did not expect India to sow seeds of confusion over the question of a LTTE-dominated Interim Administration for the North East Province. He noted that India, like other countries, was supporting the Tamils' stand that the North and East should not be separated.

Meanwhile AFP from Colombo said that rebel Tamil Tigers threw down the gauntlet yesterday saying Sri Lanka's faltering peace process would collapse unless the government gave in to their demands for political power.

The stark warning by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) came as Colombo indicated it was banking on foreign diplomacy with help from Norwegian and Japanese peace brokers to salvage the peace bid.

The LTTE said it would submit its own proposals for establishing an interim administration in the island's embattled areas in response to a government offer made in July.

The group's constitutional experts met in Paris last month to formulate a counter proposal and are expected to finalise their position before the end of the month, the Tigers said.