News

The highly anticipated cabinet reshuffle will take place on Sunday morning (25), according to a spokesperson at the Presidential Secretariat.

President Sirisena had received the list of UNP ministers last evening and the list of Cabinet ministers from the SLFP has also been finalised.

As both the UNP and the SLFP leadership have taken a joint decision to refrain from allocating portfolios to ministers facing charges of corruption and other irregularities, it is reported that the new Cabinet will reflect these changes.

Sri Lanka will launch a global marketing campaign starting from next month to attract more and more tourists to the country, an official here said on Thursday.

Speaking to Xinhua, Consultant to the Tourism Promotion Minister, Felix Rodriguez said that Sri Lanka had planned to increase its tourist arrivals up to 4 million by 2020.

"We received only around 2 million last year. If we are to increase it up to 4 million in another couple of years, it will be a challenging task," he said.

He said the digital promotion campaign would be launched next month, targeting tourists from China, India, France, Germany and Britain.

"Afterwards, we will go to the next step of advertising in global media outlets. We need to increase the frequency of our flight operations with various destinations in the region to facilitate increased arrivals," he said.

According to Rodriguez, Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe has appointed a committee to look into the development of tourism industry in the country.

Tourism is a growing industry in Sri Lanka, with the highest number of arrivals from the countries such as China and India.

Sri Lanka bond yields were flat and the rupee was steady, but stock were weaker though there were concerns that Finance Minister Mangala Samaraweera who had the confidence of the private sector, may change, dealers and analysts said.

Stocks were trading marginally lower after one hour of trading Friday.

"Mangala Samaraweera and Indrajit Coomaraswamy had managed to bring back confidence," a dealer said.

"There is some confidence that what is promised will happen. He is also not corrupt. But if Mangala (Samaraweera) is changed things will become uncertain again. It is not only investors but even importers are concerned."

Sri Lanka's business environment is highly uncertain for all businesses due to a parliament which has been made subservient to a midnight gazette, where taxes are changed while citizen's sleep.

Samaraweera however presented a budget without the unco-ordinated actions seen in 2015 and 2016. The appointment of State Minister of Finance as Eran Wickramaratne had also helped.

Sri Lanka's coalition administration is set to announce several changes to the cabinet, after a bondscam by the central bank which is under Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe hit the credibility of 'good governance'. There has been suggestions that the finance ministry be re-structured to include banks and the central bank, official sources said, though it is not yet clear, whether Samaraweea will lead it. Media is likey to be split from the ministry.

Unlike in well-governed countries where the Prime Minister does not have a key portfolio and plays a 'class monitor' role, Sri Lanka's Prime Minister got caught in the scandal due to his having a key ministry.

A Cabinet Committee on Economic Management had also been blamed for delaying projects, with the Prime Minister again seen to be micro-managing the government instead of delegating and managing through exception reporting.

Not giving adequate responsibilities to young leaders who helped bring the administration to power and giving posts to favourites who either take questionable decisions or cannot defend policy publicly had contributed to embarrassing the administration, critics say.

Coomaraswamy (appointed by President Maithripala Sirisena) is widely recognized as the best appointment made by the current administration.

Over the last few days the forex market has been floating, with no money printed in Treasury bill markets to put pressure on the rupee. (Economy Next)

Minister Counsellor (Defence) attached to the Sri Lankan High Commission in London, Brigadier Priyankara Fernando arrived in Sri Lanka today.

He was recalled for special consultations on the video published on social media capturing him making a ‘throat-slitting’ gesture in response to a Tamil group of protesters outside the Sri Lankan High Commission premises in London.

Brigadier Priyankara Fernando was immediately recalled from his service following the release of the video but was reinstated soon after, with the intervention of President Maithripala Sirisena.

Source : Daily News

Army Commander Lieutenant General Mahesh Senanayake has appointed a high level six-member Court of Inquiry (C of I) comprising senior Army Officers, chaired by Major General Rukmal Dias, to look into all aspects related to the bus explosion at Kahagolla, Diyatalawa which took place on Wednesday (21), in which 19 persons were injured, including security forces personnel and civilians.

This Court of Inquiry is expected to submit its findings and the report within a few days to the Commander of the Army.

The People's Action for Free and Fair Elections (PAFFREL) will take legal action against candidates who breached the Election law at the recently concluded Local Authorities Elections.

PAFFREL Executive Director Rohana Hettiarachchi told the Daily News that 15 such candidates have been identified so far in the first round of information gathering.

“The candidates who bribed the voters are among them. All of them are from the main parties. However, we need to collect concrete evidence before filing cases and at times the people hesitate to come out and give evidence,” he said.

Commenting on the list of 80 corrupt candidates in the fray at the previous elections as identified by the PAFFEREL, he said the majority had been defeated, but about 10 such candidates had won while two of them had been nominated as Heads of LG bodies.

“All of them represent the main parties and we decided to write to the General Secretaries of those parties urging not to appoint them as Heads of those respective LG bodies,” he said.

He also regretted that the bill on 'Campaign Finance Upper Limitation for Elections', which the PAFFEREL took the initiation to draft, was handed over to the Government in August last year but did not proceed thereafter.

He said the Election watchdog groups have decided to collectively pressure the Government to adopt the legislation before the forthcoming Provincial Council Elections.

Source : Daily News

Marking a year of continuous protests in search of their loved ones, relatives of forcibly disappeared in the north and east of Sri Lanka called upon international powers to come to their assistance.

Tamils from Kilinochchi, Jaffna, Vavuniya, Trincomalee and Mullaitivu districts who came to Kilinochchi town were certain that their family members taken to custody by security forces are still alive.

“Foreign nations that assisted the government to conduct a war, have a duty to come and help us find our children who disappeared after they were taken by the military,” said several mothers

Many global powers including the US, UK, India, Israel, Pakistan and China helped Sri Lanka in the war that concluded in a massacre in 2009.

'Soft diplomacy'

Tamils fleeing the war were compelled to hand over thousands of their family members who were alive to the military and many others were abducted.

“We have evidence to prove that they are alive. If not, the government should tell us what happened to them”.

Several Tamil civil society organisations echoing the sentiment of the relatives have urged the international community and institutions take responsibility for finding a solution to enforced disappearances in Sri Lanka.

“The international community’s ‘soft diplomacy’ approach to Sri Lanka has only served to allow the government to place issues of truth, justice and accountability on the back-burner,” says a joint statement by the organisations.

Source : JDS

Sri Lanka's High Commissioner to the United Kingdom, Amari Wijewardena, has tendered her resignation, according to reports widely circulated in local media.

However, the Ministry in a press release today noted that the reports being circulated in the media attributed to the Secretary to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, stating that Sri Lanka’s High Commissioner to the UK, Mrs. Amari Wijewardene, has resigned, are incorrect.

Foreign Ministry in a release further stated that High Commissioner Wijewardene will conclude her contract on her own volition by 31 March 2018.

Amari Wijewardene was appointed as Sri Lanka’s High Commissioner to the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland in 2016. Prior to her appointment as High Commissioner, she was the Chairperson and Managing Director of the Swadeshi Group of Companies.

Sri Lanka has failed to show significant improvement in the Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) 2017, released by Transparency International, the global movement against corruption. The index ranks 180 countries and territories by their perceived levels of public sector corruption. Sri Lanka has moved up 4 places from 95th to 91st, far more importantly its CPI score has only risen by two points from 36 to 38, representing the slow rate of progress.

Transparency International Sri Lanka (TISL), the local chapter of the global movement, says they concerned by the fact that Sri Lanka's current CPI score of 38 is the same score that prevailed in 2014. Speaking on the country's performance in CPI 2017, TISL Executive Director Asoka Obeyesekere said, "A close analysis of Sri Lanka's positioning in the CPI from 2012 to 2017 shows that despite the institutional strengthening of anti-corruption agencies following the 19th amendment, consistent failure in implementation has led to very limited progress".

Sri Lanka has failed to show any significant progress in its CPI score year on year for the past 5 years – an increase or decrease of 6 points or more represents a significant change. Obeyesekere added, "it would seem that the anti-corruption drive has limited momentum. Citizens still face corruption when trying to avail of essential public services, ranging from waste collection to school enrollment. Therefore, the limited change in the perception of public sector corruption (CPI) reflects the limited change experienced by people in their everyday encounters with the state."

Progressive legal reforms such as giving citizens the right to freely access asset declarations of public representatives and the passage of the essential National Audit Bill have also been stalled in Cabinet, which is indicative of a lack of bureaucratic and political will.

Globally, New Zealand and Denmark have been ranked first and second, with CPI scores of 89 and 88 respectively. The index uses a points scale of zero to 100, where zero is highly corrupt and 100 is very clean. This year, the index found that more than two-thirds of countries score below 50, with an average score of 43. Sri Lanka's CPI score of 38 is well below the average score of 44 for the Asia-Pacific region. Among the SAARC member states Bhutan leads with a score of 67, followed by India (40), Sri Lanka (38), Maldives (33), Pakistan (32), Nepal (31), Bangladesh (28) and Afghanistan (15).

In its global press release on the launch of CPI 2017, Transparency International noted that an analysis of the results highlighted the relationship between corruption levels, the protection of journalistic freedoms and engagement of civil society. It found that almost all journalists killed since 2012 were killed in countries with high levels of perceived corruption. The analysis shows that in the last six years, more than 9 out of 10 journalists were killed in countries that score 45 or less on the Corruption Perceptions Index. This means that, on average, every week at least one journalist is killed in a country that is highly corrupt. In addition, one in five journalists that died were covering a story about corruption. Sadly, justice was never served in the majority of these cases.

Since its inception in 1995, the Corruption Perceptions Index, Transparency International’s flagship publication, is the leading global indicator of public sector corruption. The index offers an annual snapshot of the relative degree of corruption by ranking countries from all over the globe.

The Sri Lanka Army assured that there isn’t any terrorist involvement in the incident where a passenger bus caught fire after an explosion in Kahagolla, Diyatalawa, this morning.

The Military Spokesman said that 19 individuals were injured by the explosion and were rushed to the Diyatalawa Hospital. Out of the 19 injured, 7 individuals were Army personnel and 5 individuals were Air Force personnel.

The condition of two Army personnel is reportedly critical.

The explosion occurred after the passengers who were heading towards Diyatalawa were transferred to another bus at the Bandarawela town, the Sri Lanka Army media sources said. The Police are conducting further investigations.

Defence attaché Brigadier Priyanka Fernando who was filmed making a threatening throat-slitting gesture had been summoned to Sri Lanka, for a “discussion with the army commander” said military spokesman Sumith Atapattu.

Brigadier Fernando was initially suspended by the Sri Lanka ministry of foreign affairs on 6 February, only to be reinstated by a presidential directive in less than 24 hours.

Security concerns

Two weeks later, he has been requested to be in Sri Lanka by the army chief.

“This is not for any disciplinary action, this is not probe,” Brigadier Sumith Atapattu told journalists in Colombo.

“We need to take care of his security. We need to check whether he can carry on with his duties under this situation. We need to think about the embarrassment to the country.”

No decision has been taken to replace Brigadier Priyanka Fernando as the defence attaché in the Sri Lanka High Commission in London, the army spokesman added.

Source : JDS

A team of Thai experts arrived in Sri Lanka to look at the possibility of creating artificial rain in severe drought-affected areas of the island country, today.

The group consisting of Thai engineers visited the Castlereagh and Maussakele Reservoirs in the catchment areas of the Central Highlands to seek the possibilities of creating artificial rain as water levels in these reservoirs had seen a drastic drop.

Officials from the Power and Renewable Energy Ministry said that the team also planned to visit the main Victoria, Randenigala and Kotmale reservoirs.

Local media reports said the Thai engineers represent the only company in the world that has the patent to create artificial rain.

The company had created artificial rain when the island country was severely affected by a drought in 1981. Hundreds of families remain affected by months of severe drought due to the lack of rains and delayed monsoonal rains in the central parts of Sri Lanka.