China would work with Sri Lanka to promote the comprehensive and cooperative partnership to a new height, said Vice Premier Li Keqiang here on Friday. "We attach great importance to the traditional friendship with Sri Lanka," Li told visiting Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Rohitha ... [More]

Updating its travel advisory Wednesday, Britain warned its nationals “against all travel to the north and east of Sri Lanka, and to Yala National Park and the areas around it.” The new advisory was issued with an update on new surveillance measures at Bandaranayake International Airport related to A... [More]

Despite assuring the international community that most Tamils interned in militarized detention camps would be resettled by the end 2009, the Sri Lankan government is turning Manik Farm, the largest barbed-wire ringed site, into a permanent detention centre, The Times newspaper reported Friday. Tam... [More]

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has asked Sri Lanka to initiate steps to rehabilitate 'child soldiers' released by LTTE and ensure them access to care, protection and reintegration programmes. Ban asked Colombo to ensure effective implementation of its "zero tolerance" position on child... [More]

The number of ministers in the Cabinet of ruling party United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) led by President Mahinda Rajapakse rose to one hundred and thirteen Thursday with the induction of two more ministers, Nandana Gunatilake and Piyasiri Wijenayake of the National Freedom Front (NFF), a splin... [More]

The highway between Vavuniyaa and Horowopottana has been re-opened for public transport after several years of closure. Vavuniyaa Government Agent Ms. P. M. Charles said the route is now open for public transport including state and private sector bus services with effect from Wednesday, according t... [More]

Sri Lankan government officials are running a prostitution racket using Tamil women interned in at least one of the militarised camps for displaced people, The Australian newspaper reported Thursday. "It's been brought to the attention of senior government officials but no one seems to be doin... [More]

Sri Lankan authorities appear to be building permanent camps to house many of the 300,000 refugees from the last phase of the war with the Tamil Tiger rebels, despite promising to resettle 80 per cent of them by the end of the year. Aid workers have told The Times that permanent buildings are bein... [More]

Jeremy Page: analysis When President Rajapaksa of Sri Lanka declared victory over the Tamil Tigers in May, he reached out to the Tamil minority that the defeated rebels had claimed to represent over 26 years of civil war. Speaking in Tamil, as well as his native Sinhalese, he told Parliament in ... [More]

For the first time since a section of the Tamil groups in Sri Lanka took to arms 30 years ago to fight for their rights, representatives of all political parties came together here on Thursday at the inaugural meeting of the newly constituted All-Parties Committee (APC) for Development and Reconcil... [More]

Army Commander General Sarath Fonseka, yesterday made his first visit to Jaffna Security Forces Headquarters after the successful completion of military operations to eliminate LTTE terrorism, the Army Headquarters announced yesterday. The Army Commander was received by Commander Security Forces Hea... [More]

All major opposition parties in Sri Lanka have heeded a government call to join its development and reconciliation effort in view of the end of the island's long drawn-out civil war, government and party officials said Thursday. The parties attended the All Party Committee for Development and Rec... [More]

Days after Sri Lanka's government defeated its long-time foe, the Tamil Tigers, in May, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon flew into the country's capital, Colombo, for a 24-hour visit to urge its president to open up its refugee camps to international aid groups. This was another urgent ... [More]

Visiting Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama said on Thursday, that China has always been a friend to Sri Lanka and that he was seeking closer bilateral ties during his five-day official visit. "China has remained a friend of Sri Lanka in times of difficulty. A friend in need is a... [More]

Although the Sri Lanka Security Forces completely defeated the LTTE more than a month ago, more and more weapons including sophisticated weapons hidden by  Tamil Tigers still continue to be unearthed by the troops in many areas in the recently liberated Wanni as well as the east. In the recent... [More]

Representatives of civil organizations, NGOs, Traders’ Circle and other participants requested the President of Bank of Ceylon, Dr. Gamini Wickremasinghe, to expedite the return of all the money and jewelry of Jaffna people taken to the Central Bank in Colombo in 1996 for security reasons, Wednesday... [More]

A new group of eminent Tamil people in Sri Lanka has made a plea for those held in government camps to be given a timetable for their release. The group said people were yearning to be released from their confinement. The camps still house nearly 300,000 Tamils displaced in the final stages of t... [More]

Unidentified armed men arriving in a jeep abducted Friday night a Tamil youth travelling in a three-wheeler while on the same day armed men in Sri Lanka Army (SLA) uniforms took away a Tamil youth from his house in Koapaave’li in Batticaloa saying that he was to be interrogated, according to complai... [More]

After more than a week of silence by the UN about two of its staff members grabbed up by Sri Lanka's government, on July 1 Inner City Press again asked Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's spokesperson Michele Montas about their fate. This time, Ms. Montas had an answer. The UN has "hired a lawyer w... [More]

The Inter-Parliamentary Union is calling on the government of Sri Lanka to mount a thorough investigation of the murders of three Members of Parliament, two of them Tamils.  The IPU's Human Rights Committee, which has wrapped up its latest session, has examined cases of abuse of some 300 MPs i... [More]