Category: Defense

COLOMBO, May 10, 2014 (AFP) – Sri Lanka’s military said Saturday it had unearthed the biggest cache of pistol ammunition buried in the former war zone amid government claims that Tiger rebels are trying regroup.Naval troops found the buried ammunition Friday in the coastal area of Mullaittivu where the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam […]

COLOMBO, April 11, 2014 (AFP) – Sri Lanka’s military on Friday shot dead three men they believed were trying to revive the separatist Tamil Tiger movement five years after its defeat, a spokesman said.Military spokesman Brigadier Ruwan Wanigasooriya said troops killed the three, including a man they identified as a local leader of the Tigers, […]

COLOMBO, November 27, 2013 (AFP) – Sri Lanka was to begin compiling a death toll from its ethnic conflict Thursday as it seeks to fend off growing pressure over allegations of mass killings at the end of the war.While Jaffna held its first provincial elections since the war in September, with the main Tamil party […]

COLOMBO, September 13, 2013 (AFP) – Police in Sri Lanka have discovered 100 kilos (220 pounds) of TNT on a truck impounded at a Colombo police station for the past 17 years, officials said Friday.The vehicle had been seized in February 1996, during the country’s civil war, less than two weeks after a truck bomb […]

COLOMBO, September 3, 2013 (AFP) – Sri Lanka risks a “re-emergence of terrorism” as Tamil Tiger rebels and their sympathisers living abroad revive a campaign for a separate state, the country’s top defence official said Tuesday.“Sri Lanka had enough divisions in the past that ultimately led to conflict,” Rajapakse added.“We must learn the lessons from […]

August 30, 2013 (AFP) – Sri Lanka’s army on Friday reprimanded senior officers accused of leading a deadly crackdown earlier this month on villagers who were demonstrating against contaminated water, the military said.She is visiting Sri Lanka in connection with allegations that troops killed up to 40,000 civilians in the final stages of the war […]

COLOMBO, July 19, 2013 (AFP) – European parliamentarians Friday asked Sri Lanka to deliver on promises to investigate allegations of war crimes and ensure ethnic reconciliation more than four years after crushing Tamil separatists.A delegation of EU lawmakers requested Colombo ensure accountability in the face of what the UN calls “credible allegations” of up to […]

LONDON, July 17, 2013 (AFP) – Britain has issued export licences worth £12 billion ( billion, 14 billion euros) for the sale of military equipment to states deemed possible rights violators including Syria, Iran and China, lawmakers said Wednesday.But the report also raised concerns about a further five countries for which licences were issued: Argentina, […]

May 31, 2013 (AFP) – Sri Lanka and Thailand Friday called for enhanced defence and maritime security cooperation to tackle terrorism, President Mahinda Rajapakse’s office said.The two countries agreed to share more intelligence at the start of an overnight visit to Sri Lanka by Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra, the presidential secretariat said in a […]

May 19, 2013 (AFP) – Sri Lanka’s navy Sunday recovered the body of a sailor who drowned during a parade marking the fourth anniversary of the defeat of Tamil Tiger rebels, an official said. The body was found near a beach in Colombo where his small boat capsized while taking part in the victory celebrations […]

Apr 28, 2013 (LBO) – The United States is providing Coast Guard training as part of a maritime security co-operation program, the US embassy in Colombo said.One Sri Lankan officer will graduate from his four month training in May and the other will complete his three month training in June 2013. A batch of 20 […]

Oct 05, 2012 (LBO) – Maldives an Indian Ocean tourist paradise and the US are conducting joint military exercises to boost military interoperability between the forces of two countries and skills training, the US embassy in Colombo said. The participating U.S. units are mainly from I Marine Expeditionary Force, based in Camp Pendleton, California, with […]