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Sri Lanka president rejects foreign war crimes probe
May 28, 2010 (AFP) – Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapakse has rejected international calls for a war crimes probe into the final offensive against Tamil Tiger rebels last year. Sri Lanka has been under pressure to submit to an international investigation after the United Nations reported that at least 7,000 civilians perished in the final […]
Sri Lanka needs to contain deficit for long term growth: ADB chief
May 28, 2010 (LBO) – Sri Lanka has to contain its fiscal deficit to sustain growth and maintain stability as the country emerges from a 30-year conflict and rebuilds war damaged infrastructure, Asian Development Bank President Haruhiko Kuroda said. In 2009, Sri Lanka’s deficit expanded to 9.8 percent of gross domestic product overshooting a 7.0 […]
Sri Lanka welcomes end to US travel warning
May 27, 2010 (AFP) – Sri Lanka on Thursday welcomed the lifting of a US warning against travel to the Indian Ocean island, anticipating a boost to tourism and investment a year after a bloody civil war ended. The number of holidaymakers arriving in the four months to April this year rose nearly 50 percent […]
Great Expectations
May 27, 2010 (LBO) – Education is an issue which many of us think we know how to fix, but, nobody is giving us the reigns. Lucky Minister Bandula Gunawardna the education ministry has fallen on his lap. Unlucky Minister BG – expectations about the ministry are high but there is no way that they […]
Boat People
KUALA LUMPUR, May 27, 2010 (AFP) – Sixty-one Sri Lankan asylum seekers held in a Malaysian immigration depot Thursday entered day three of a hunger strike in a desperate effort to win freedom and settlement in a third country. Immigration authorities could not be reached for comment. Activists say Malaysia is often used as a […]
Sri Lanka forex reserve edge up in March
May 27, 2010 (LBO) – Sri Lanka foreign exchange reserves rose to 5,192 million US dollars in March 2010 from 5,032 million dollars a month earlier, with imports and remittances also expanding, the Central Bank said. Sri Lanka’s has a pegged exchange rate and foreign remittances as well as net foreign borrowings of the state […]
Sri Lanka stocks close 0.5-pct up
May 26, 2010 (LBO) – Sri Lankan stocks closed higher Wednesday helped by midcap and penny stocks, while Confifi Hotels stocks shot up 46.5 percent amidst low volume trading in take-over play, brokers said. Asia Capital, an investment bank with stock brokering licenses closed at 33.00 rupees, up 2.00, Ceylon Hospitals closed at 75. 75 […]
Sri Lanka Confifi hotel shares up on take-over play
May 26, 2010 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s Confifi group hotels shares rose 46 percent to 318 rupees Wednesday with buyers expecting a battle for management control after Lanka Orix Leasing Company bought into the group. LOLC bought a 43.3 percent stake in Confifi Hotel Holdings, which in additional to owning a hotel also owns 21.8 […]
Sri Lanka external trade up, apparel exports down
May 26, 2010 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s external trade expanded in March 2010 with imports growing 6. 5 percent to 1090 million US dollars and with exports growing 4. 8 percent to 662.7 million rupees and but apparel exports fell. In March apparel exports fell 9. 5 percent from a year earlier to 281 million […]
Sri Lanka protectionists score against trade liberties
May 26, 2010 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s increasingly strident protectionist business interests have staged an apparently successful protest in the capital Colombo against further liberalization of trade and services with India. The protest came ahead of a visit by India’s foreign secretary who was expected to push for a revival of a liberalization deal in […]
Sri Lanka protectionists stage high profile protest against freer trade
May 25, 2010 (AFP) – Hundreds of protesters took to the streets in the capital Colombo Tuesday demanding Sri Lanka’s government abandon a proposed trade pact with neighbouring India. President Mahinda Rajapakse met the demonstrators at his tightly-guarded Temple Trees residence in Colombo and vowed he would not enter any pact that was harmful to […]
Sri Lanka urges US to tackle business, not just human rights
WASHINGTON, May 26, 2010 (AFP) – New Sri Lankan Foreign Minister G. L. Peiris on Tuesday urged Washington to seize business and other opportunities in post-war Sri Lanka rather than focus only on alleged human rights abuses there. Visiting Washington after Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse’s party won parliamentary elections last month, Peiris parried criticism […]