Sampanthan emerged from the meeting to say ``we certainly don't support child recruitment,'' and have told the LTTE so.

But children are destitute in the Sri Lanka - 's northeastern LTTE-controlled region, Sampanthan added.

``In those situations, it is possible that LTTE lends a helping hand to some of those children.''

Samanthan suggested some may then use the Tigers' charity to accuse them of recruitment.

Earlier this month, New York-based Human Rights Watch alleged that ``forcible recruitment of children has intensified and new recruits outnumber those released,'' by the Tamil Tigers.

UNICEF also claimed the rebels forcibly recruited three tsunami-affected girls living in camps after the Dec. 26 disaster, a charge categorically denied by the LTTE leadership.

``We have answered the prime minister very frankly,'' Sampanthan said Monday.

``And I assume the prime minister will now be in a position to formulate different thoughts on some of these questions. We look forward to that.''

But Martin didn't appear to be buying Sampanthan's argument about Tamil Tiger charity after meeting three TNA politicians and the head of Tamil group seeking charitable tax status in Canada.

``They talked about the fact there are a number of orphans but we both agreed and I made the point quite strongly that in fact the children should be going to school, they shouldn't be put in the army,'' Martin told reporters.

Sampanthan's Tamil National Alliance doesn't actually speak for the LTTE and is not formally affiliated with it. But one senior Canadian government official described the TNA as ``analagous to Sein Fein,'' the political wing of the IRA.

Martin has been walking a fine political line by courting Canada's 250,000-strong Tamil community, Conservative MP Jason Kenney said Monday in Colombo. Kenney is among about a dozen MPs who have joined the prime minister's nine-day tour of Asia.

``Obviously, there's domestic politics involved in this,'' said Kenney.

``It would be my hope the prime minister would listen to the advice of the RCMP and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service to ban organizations that are acting as terrorist fronts in Canada.''

Canada has barred groups from raising money for the LTTE under UN anti-terrorism provisions. But unlike the United States and Britain, Canada has not banned the organization itself.

Martin said the Sri Lankan government doesn't want Ottawa to provoke the situation by taking that extra step. In fact, Canada is being encouraged by both sides to take a more active role in renewing stalled peace talks.

The rebels signed a Norwegian-brokered ceasefire with Colombo in February 2002, but the rebels walked away from peace talks the following year, refusing to negotiate until the government accepted their demands for greater autonomy in the Tamil-dominated northeast.

The Tigers fought a 19-year insurgency against the government to carve out a separate state for ethnic minority Tamils, accusing the majority Sinhalese of discrimination. The conflict killed more than 65,000 people. Published: Mon Jan 17 14:44:39 EST 2005

The prime minister has promised to ensure that foreign aid to Sri Lanka - is distributed equitably throughout the country, and his political meetings in Colombo were to that end.

But Martin appeared to have little patience for political infighting after visiting Kalmunai.

``There comes a time when human beings are facing trauma,'' the prime minister told a news conference in Colombo.

``You should set the politics aside and take a look at what other people are facing. There should be one focus and that should be what we can do to help them.'' Published: Mon Jan 17 20:16:34 EST 2005