Category:
Sri Lanka treasury yields plummet, rupee gains
Oct 31, 2007 (LBO) – Sri Lanka treasury yields plummeted at Wednesday’s auction with the benchmark 3-month bill falling 143 basis points to 15.80 percent as domestic borrowings reduced in the wake of a foreign bond issue.The government’s debt office said it retired 3.1 billion worth maturing debt and accepted 8.5 billion worth of bids. […]
Sri Lanka leisure group buys Maldives resort
Oct 31, 2006 (LBO) – Sri Lankan conglomerate Aitken Spence has announced that it has bought another island resort in the Maldivian archipelago where it is already one of the top leisure operators. Aitken Spence Hotels (International), a subsidiary of Aitken Spence Hotel Holdings, said it had acquired the Vadhoo Island Resort for 13 million […]
Curbing Corruption
Oct 31, 2007 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s bribery and corruption commission has vast powers to probe official misdeeds but cannot act except on a complaint and has its impartiality questioned by the presence of police investigators. Although commission officials say it is one of the most flexible and authoritative bodies compared to similar departments around […]
Paradise Isle
GENEVA, Oct 30, 2007 (AFP) – The UN’s top torture expert, Manfred Nowak, said on Tuesday that torture — including beatings, asphyxiation and burning — was becoming “routine” during counter-terrorism operations in Sri Lanka.Nowak said in statement on his mission to the conflict-torn Indian Ocean island earlier this month that there was evidence that “torture […]
Growing pains for Maldives as radicals raise tensions
MALE, Oct 31, 2007 (AFP) – The Maldives has built South Asia’s most successful economy based on luxury tourism, but the atoll nation is now facing religious tensions as it undergoes a difficult transition to democracy.The tranquillity of the paradise holiday destination was shattered in September when Islamic radicals set off a home-made bomb, wounding […]
‘s Ambani not so rich after all, says company
NEW DELHI, Oct 30, 2007 (AFP) – Indian conglomerate Reliance Industries moved swiftly Tuesday to deny a report that company chief Mukesh Ambani has become the world’s richest man thanks to a surge in India’s stock market.The report by the Press Trust of India putting his wealth at 63.2 billion dollars saw newspapers hailing his […]
Sri Lanka want Aussies to fight for Warne-Murali Trophy
Oct 31, 2007 (AFP) – Sri Lanka Cricket on Wednesday formally suggested to Australia to mark their upcoming Test series with a trophy named after spin rivals Shane Warne and Muttiah Muralitharan.The country’s governing body said they had written to Cricket Australia that the winner of the two-Test series, opening in Brisbane on November 8, […]
Sri Lanka to withdraw censorship?
Oct 31, 2007 (AFP) – Sri Lanka has imposed blanket censorship on war reporting, officials said Wednesday, a week after a devastating attack on its air force, but is reconsidering the move following media protests.The government then came under fire from media rights groups after saying it would like to hire hackers to stop the […]
Sri Lanka issues gazette on war reporting censorship
Oct 31, 2007 (AFP) – Sri Lanka imposed censorship on war reporting a week after Tamil Tiger rebels carried out a devastating attack on the country’s air force, a government notice showed Wednesday.President Mahinda Rajapakse used tough emergency laws to ban the publication of any information on military operations as well as procurements, a gazette […]
Sri Lanka online journalist shot in capital
Oct 31, 2007 (LBO) – A media rights body has called for an open inquiry in to the shooting of an online journalist in Colombo, days after government withdrew the license of a radio station and politicians verbally attacked news websites.Although the Free Media Movement (FMM) does not have any evidence to blame any party […]
” in Sri Lanka: UN expert
GENEVA, Oct 30, 2007 (AFP) – The UN’s top torture expert, Manfred Nowak, said on Tuesday that torture — including beatings, asphyxiation and burning — was becoming “routine” during counter-terrorism operations in Sri Lanka.Violence has surged on the island since a Norwegian-arranged truce began unravelling in December 2005. Nowak said in statement on his mission […]
Sri Lanka inflation jumps in October to 19.6 %
Oct 31, 2007 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s inflation rocketed 3.8 percent in October driving consumer prices in the capital Colombo during the past 12-months to 19.6 percent, the government’s statistics office said. At the beginning of the year, the central bank promised to limit inflation to only 10 percent a year, but later admitted it […]