COLOMBO -- Norway, which engineered a cease-fire to Sri Lanka's 20-year ethnic war, will try this week to push the government and Tamil Tigers back to the negotiating table five months after talks broke down.

Deputy Foreign Minister Vidar Helgesen was to hold a round of meetings with the government, including Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, and the Tamil Tigers on resuming the talks and on aid, the Norwegian Embassy said on Tuesday.

An embassy statement said it was a routine trip, but added that Helgesen and peace envoy Erik Solheim would discuss "the question of a possible resumption of direct talks between the parties" during their meetings, Reuters reported.

Although the truce signed in February 2002 is the longest since the separatist war broke out, peace talks that began one year ago broke down in April when the Tigers walked away, saying the government had reneged on promises to rebuild Tamil areas.

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) are expected to deliver a response by the end of the month to a government proposal on power-sharing in the Tamil-dominated north and east, much of which is already under rebel control.

Government officials said that could set up another round of direct talks within the next several months on permanently ending the war that has killed 64,000 people.

Helgesen will also discuss "how to ensure progress in the humanitarian and rehabilitation work in the war-affected areas".

The aid has been tied to progress in the peace process and Helgesen's two-day visit from Wednesday follows one by Japanese envoy Yasushi Akashi, who said on Monday that the international community was impatient with delays in resuming talks.

"There is a danger that international attention, which is always fickle, might shift to other trouble spots," Akashi said.

Akashi was in Sri Lanka to meet other aid donors as a follow-up to a June donor conference in Tokyo that raised $4.5 billion to rebuild the island.

Helgesen's arrival also coincides with a planned protest by the National Bhikkhu Front, a Buddhist group that says the current peace process will lead to the breakup of the island.