The Tamil Tiger chief, one of South Asia's most-wanted men, made his first public appearance in 15 years yesterday, emerging from a jungle hideout to say he will not yet abandon the fight for an independent state.

"The struggle for political independence is the demand of Tamil people," said the reclusive rebel leader, Velupillai Prabhakaran.

Still, he insisted his Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam are "Sincerely and seriously committed to peace," as demonstrated by their declared cease-fire in the 18-year-old separatist war.

Prabhakaran also expressed confidence that a Norwegian-mediated peace process will succeed.

"This is the first time a third party or government has involved itself in facilitating the peace process," Prabhakaran said of the more than two years of Norwegian efforts that culminated in a cease-fire agreement on Feb. 22.

"With the mediation help by the Norwegian government, I believe this process will succeed this time," he said.

Prabhakaran's Tamil Tigers have been fighting government forces since 1983 to create a separate homeland in northern and eastern Sri Lanka. The civil war, one of Asia's longest, has cost more than 64,000 lives.

Flanked by guards in camouflaged body armor and armed with automatic rifles, Prabhakaran addressed the news conference at a secret location near rebel-held Kilinochchi, about 250 miles north of the capital, Colombo.

The Food and Drug Administration cracked down on Internet sellers of nicotine-laced lollipops and lip balm yesterday, declaring them illegal and ordering that three pharmacies stop sales immediately.

The lollipops in particular pose a risk to children because they look like regular candy, the FDA warned.

"The quantity of nicotine could be potentially dangerous to a small child," said FDA attorney David Horowitz.

He urged smokers to switch to FDA-approved smoking-cessation products. The agency can't say for sure if the lollipops pose an immediate health risk to adult smokers, because they are made with a different form of nicotine than is found in nicotine gum, patches or other approved products. That form of nicotine has not been tested for safety.

That alone makes the lollipops and lip balm illegal to sell, but the Internet pharmacies also had been wrongly dispensing them without a doctor's prescription, the FDA said.

The FDA gave the three pharmacies 15 days to tell the government they're stopping sales or risk further legal action. The pharmacies are Ashland Drugs in Ashland, Miss., Bird's Hill Pharmacy in Needham, Mass., and The Compounding Pharmacy in Aurora, Ill.

The FDA is reviewing other unconventional nicotine products, such as a Virginia company's nicotine lozenge, to see if they also qualify as drugs being sold illegally.

"I didn't know there'd be a problem" with selling the lollipops, said Larry Melton, owner of Ashland Drugs, who said he created them because customers had requested alternatives to gum or patches.

An urgent appeal for blood donations is paying off for United Blood Services, although Type O blood donations are still needed.

The company said Arizona's blood supply has improved slightly in the past few days but it still hasn't reached levels needed to support hospital demands.

United Blood officials said there still is an emergency shortage of Type O blood and the company also needs to bolster supplies of other blood types.

The center wants to collect an additional 500 units of Type O blood over the next two days to return supplies to normal.