The government of Sri Lanka told parliament on Tuesday that it cannot abolish the notorious Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) and there would be no possibility of it in the future, due to "some dark shadows of the LTTE and terrorism."

Asserting that the government would not use the PTA to curtail political opposition or government critics, Sri Lanka's Prime Minister D.M. Jayaratne said:

"It is the duty of the government to ensure the maintenance of law and order and if anyone violates the laws and act in breach of the regulations mentioned in the Penal Code or the Prevention of Terrorism Act he or she would be arrested,"

"The PTA was brought in 1978 and its provisions have been effectively used to wipe out terrorism from this country. The request made by the Leader of the Opposition to do away with the PTA cannot be done so as still there are some dark shadows of the LTTE and terrorism are in some places of the country,"

"The provisions are needed to arrest the LTTE members hiding without participating in the rehabilitation programs and to recover the weapons hid by them. The two recent incidents where a Tamil politician had been killed on March 17, 2012 by LTTE members returned from India and arresting of four LTTE members who had provided training to the terrorists on India on December 20, 2012 could be cited to prove that there are still some terrorist activities going on and therefore we as a government would not be in a position to do away with the PTA at the moment."