Norwegian peace facilitators in Sri Lankan government's engagement with the Tamil Tigers Friday stepped up their current efforts with a top level ministerial visit, diplomatic sources in Colombo said.

Norway's Minister of International Development Erik Solheim arrived at the Colombo international airport at 6:30 a.m. local time (0100 GMT) and proceeded to have a meeting with the Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse, officials added.

The Norwegian minister's talks with Rajapakse is being viewed with interest ahead of next week's meeting in Tokyo on the Sri Lankan peace process.

The co-chairs of the Norwegian backed process with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebels, the United States, Norway, Japan and the European Union are to meet in order to review the progress since the 2003 Tokyo declaration agreed to by both warring factions.

Solheim, after his meeting with the Sri Lankan president, is to proceed to New Delhi late on Friday to apprise the Indian leaders on the present state of Sri Lanka's troubled ceasefire and the peace process.

Violence, which saw a dramatic increase since December last year, prevented the two sides from going ahead and meeting in Geneva for the second round of talks.

The two sides started bickering over each other's failure to honor the agreements reached at the first round held in February.

Over 200 lives have been lost since the beginning of April in the upsurge violence and the Tigers stayed away from the scheduled second round talks in Geneva on April 24-25.

The Norwegian special envoy Jon Hanssen-Bauer who is already in Colombo is set to travel to the rebel held Kilinochchi district on Saturday, officials said.

The latest Norwegian diplomatic efforts come ahead of next week 's statement by the European Union which is expected to list the LTTE as a terrorist group.

The rebels responding to a possible EU ban said that such a decision would be treated as a reversal in the ongoing peace negotiations backed by the international community.

Source: Xinhua