NEW DELHI, Feb. 11 -- Australia and the West Indies plan to maintain their boycott of Cricket World Cup matches scheduled to be played in volatile Sri Lanka after talks failed to resolve the dispute, organizers of the event said. A crucial two-day meeting of all 12 team captains, officials and organizers could not convince the two nations that matches in Sri Lanka would be safe. The boycott announcement followed a massive bomb blast that ripped through the capital Colombo Jan. 31, killing at least 80 people and injuring some 1,400 others. Organizing Committee Secretary Jagmohan Dalmiya told reporters that the Sri Lankan venues cannot be shifted, just hours before the Cup opening ceremony. The Australian and West Indies teams have said they would rather forfeit their matches than to risk their players' lives. Dalmiya said a joint team of India and Pakistan will play a goodwill match against hosts in Colombo on Feb. 13 to demonstrate confidence in Sri Lanka's security promises, the Press Trust of India reported. Australia and West Indies, the two former world champions, are scheduled to play their Colombo matches Feb. 17 and 25, respectively. Separatist Sri Lankan rebel vows that the cricketers won't be targets of terrorism haven't swayed the teams. 'We have nothing against any foreigner, and they have nothing to fear from us,' Lawrence Thilaker, a Paris-based leader of the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, or LTTE, said. 'Our targets are the Sri Lankan government and its military,' one newspaper quoted Thilaker as saying.
Australian team captain Mark Taylor and the West Indies team manager Wesley Hall separately told reporters their boycott decision was 'final,' even as the talks were in progress. 'There is no change in our decision of not playing in Sri Lanka. We are going to forfeit our matches if organizers do not agree to shift the venue,' Taylor told a news conference. 'The West Indies board had assessed the situation through diplomatic channels and decided not to send the team to Sri Lanka,' Hall told a news conference. 'We are peace-loving people and do not want conflict of any kind,' he said. Authorities have blamed the LTTE for the Jan. 31 blast, which occurred a block from the hotel where the Australian team was booked to stay. The rebels' 13-year battle for an independent nation for Sri Lanka's Tamil minority has claimed more than 40,000 lives. Australia and the West Indies have ignored 'fool-proof' security offers from Sri Lankan President Chandrika Kumaratunga, who offered to fly the teams direct from India to the playing field. The organizers had asked the International Cricket Council -- ICC -- to pursue the matter with the United Nations to mount diplomatic pressure on the two countries. 'My role wasbasically to assist the organizers in finding a solution but we cannot force Australia and West Indies to play in Sri Lanka,' West Indian ICC Chairman of the ICC, Clyde Walcott, said. He said the decision of the two teams was based on their 'confidential' assessment of the prevailing security. 'But we are not convinced with their assessment so we cannot entertain any request to change the venues,' Dalmiya told reporters in Calcutta. Zimbabwe and Kenya -- the two other teams scheduled to play in Sri Lanka -- have said they will play in Colombo. Sri Lankan cricket fans are disappointed over the boycott row, which they find insulting to the nation. 'Does it mean that India and Pakistan will now not play in England following Saturday's blast in London?' cricket fan Hareen Saram said in Colombo. And fans will miss the opportunity to see the West Indies' Brian Lara, one of the sport's most explosive batsmen. The 26-year-old superstar is hugely popular, having recently broken the record for runs scored in a single match. The boycott may hurt economically as well -- analysts have estimated Colombo will lose $43 million in revenue from the matches. Indian authorities have made stringent security arrangements for the teams and at the inaugural venue -- the Eden Gardens stadium. More than 10,000 police personnel will guard the stadium, which has a capacity of 75,000 spectators, officials said.
