Author: lbostgadmin
Sri Lankan president urges calm after bus blast
Feb 2, 2008 (AFP) – Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse blamed Tamil Tiger guerrillas for a bomb Saturday on a bus that killed at least 20 people, urging citizens not to be provoked by the rebels “brutality.” The parcel bomb went off as the crowded bus, carrying many Buddhist pilgrims belonging to the ethnic Sinhalese […]
Sri Lanka thrashed by Tasmania in one-dayer
HOBART, Australia, Feb 2, 2008 (AFP) – Opener Sanath Jayasuriya was hit in the jaw as Sri Lanka slumped to a disappointing defeat here Saturday in their final warm-up match before the triangular series against India and Australia.The Sri Lankans beat the Prime Minister’s XI comfortably on Wednesday in Canberra, but Tasmania thrashed them by […]
Sri Lanka Cricket says South Africa pull-out helped push it in to red
Feb 2, 2008 (AFP) – South Africa’s decision to quit a triangular one-day series in 2006 caused Sri Lanka’s hard-up cricketing body to lose 11 million dollars, a top official said here Saturday.Ranatunga said SLC was currently surviving on a six-million dollar bank overdraft, but India’s Test and one-day tour of Sri Lanka in July-August […]
Dirty Finance
Feb 02, 2008 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) has tied up with Malaysia’s central bank to combat cross-border money laundering and terrorist finance, the Central Bank said. “Sri Lankan authorities should ensure that the FIU should be given operational independence to ensure freedom from undue influence or interference,” the IMF said. The […]
Bus Blast
Feb 02, 2008 (LBO) — An explosion at a bus station in north-central Sri Lanka Saturday killed at least 13 people and wounded 20, police said. The Tigers have been blamed for blasting a bus in southern Sri Lanka on the same day that the ceasefire expired. A spate of farmer killings in the southern […]
Refined Product
Feb 01, 2008 (LBO) – Two UAE petroleum firms have won Sri Lankan government approval to build the island’s second refinery with an investment of 1.2 billion dollars, a senior minister said. . Trans Asia Gas International LLC and Star Petro Energy LLC of the UAE plan to build a 100,000 barrels-per-day refinery in the […]
Offshore Wealth
Feb 01, 2008 (LBO) – An oil exploration block nearest to India off Sri Lanka’s northwestern coast has become hot property with three petroleum firms chasing after it, the petroleum ministry said. The southernmost block of the three offered by Sri Lanka in the Mannar Basin, stretching from the coast to the maritime boundary with […]
Sri Lanka warring parties human rights violations unchecked: HRW
NEW YORK, Jan 31, 2008 (AFP) – Global concern is mounting over Sri Lanka’s worsening human rights record, but action by key international players has been “slow and lacked cohesion,” Human Rights Watch said in its annual report. The group said Sri Lanka managed to head off censure in the UN Human Rights Council by […]
Sri Lanka troops, Tigers in gunbattle, 18 rebels dead: officials
Feb 1, 2008 (AFP) – Security forces and Tamil Tiger rebels have traded heavy artillery fire in northern Sri Lanka, killing 18 rebels, officials said Friday, a day after Japan warned it may stop aid unless fighting subsided. Backed by war planes and heavy guns, the military smashed several rebel bunkers and killed at least […]
OPEC to keep oil output steady; Venezuela wants higher prices
VIENNA, Jan 31, 2008 (AFP) – OPEC ministers turned down calls for extra output on Thursday, voicing concern that the weak US economy may cause oil prices to drop further from recent historic peaks above 100 dollars. Most members of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries, which pumps 40 percent of world oil, said the […]
Climate change could devastate South Asia, Africa crops: study
CHICAGO, Jan 31, 2008 (AFP) – Climate change will cause severe crop losses in Africa and Asia within the next 20 years unless farming practices are changed, a study released Thursday has found. Those crop losses could lead to food shortages and a loss of livelihood among the world’s poorest people, the authors warned. And […]
Tiger smuggler in Thailand surrenders
BANGKOK, Feb 1, 2008 (AFP) – A Thai man accused of trafficking tiger and leopard carcasses as well as hundreds of live pangolins has turned himself over to authorities, police said Friday.The Thai navy raided the trafficking operation on the Laos border late Tuesday and retrieved the carcasses of six tigers and five leopards, plus […]