Under the leadership of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, bilateral summits and discussions at political and official levels have increased, further strengthening the bond between the two nations. On Sept 6 in 2022, Indian PM Narendra Modi and Sheikh Hasina signed several significant agreements further strengthening the bilateral relationship between […]

Pakistan is currently suffering from political instability and uncertainty which has increased the political environment and polarization. Unfortunately, this has resulted in attacks on media protection and press freedom in the country. Political polarization and uncertainty affect media protection in Pakistan. State-level media bans continue unabated. The Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Auth...

… USD 5 mn paid to Iran a month By Shamindra Ferdinando Power and Energy Minister Kanchana Wijesekera has confirmed that consumers of petrol and diesel have been made to pay Rs. 50 to Rs. 55 per litre since the middle of last year to settle what the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC) owed its creditors. […]

Monday 27th November, 2023 The SJB has commenced collecting signatures for a public petition as part of a campaign to have those who are responsible for the current economic crisis stripped of their civic rights. Given public resentment, which is palpable, the SJB may be able to obtain hundreds of thousands of signatures for its […]

Monday 4th September, 2023 Sri Lankans with a predilection for gratuitous violence or wanton brutality no longer have to spend money to watch western gangster movies. Local television news bulletins are full of actual scenes of violence; they are in fact scarier than taut Hollywood thrillers such as Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs. Sicarios of local gangsters […]

Tuesday 1st August, 2023 The QR code-based rationing mechanism introduced one year ago has helped halve the national fuel consumption, the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC) has said, according to media reports. In fact, it helped bring order out of chaos and thereby saved current dispensation

by Sushant Sareen The good news is that there is some new evidence that despite all the adventurism and brinkmanship, the top echelons of the Pakistan Army have, by and large, remained rational and not radicalised players. The bad news is that the Pakistan Army’s bluster and grandstanding have injected exaggerated notions of its military […]

By C. A. Chandraprema We now live in a digital world dominated by the social media, where information or disinformation coming through our mobile phones has more to do with forming public opinion than the plainly visible and palpable reality and well-established facts and data. Sri Lanka recently marked the 75th Anniversary of its Independence in […]

Thursday 9th February, 2023 President Ranil Wickremesinghe, who presented his government’s policy statement in Parliament, yesterday, sounded like a seasoned insurance sales agent with glib phrases rolling off his experienced tongue; he sought to scare the public and infuse them with hope, at the same time, to sell his policies. The knee-jerk reaction of the […]

Minister Kanchana Wijesekera has publicly stated that the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC) and the Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) have employees far in excess than required for the normal functioning of these institutions. For instance, Ceylon Petroleum Storage Terminals Ltd., has 4,200 employees where only 500 are required, and the CEB has around 26,000 employees when […]

Wednesday 31st August, 2022 Trade unions in the power and energy sectors are up in arms against a government move to restructure the Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) and the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC). They would have the public believe that the blame for the staggering losses the two institutions have been incurring should be laid […]

Yes, of course, the older folks would all remember Edward Joseph; the young ones may find the name unfamiliar as Edward now lives in Germany and does his thing in that part of the world. Better known as Eddy, he was with the leader of the group Steelers and they were big in the local […]

We run on this page today an article written by a retired Major General of the Sri Lanka Army who argues forcefully that the Aragalaya protesters were NOT repeat NOT peaceful. Over the weeks and months of the protest, which now appears to be fizzling out, although contrary claims that it will continue persist, the […]

Friday 5th August 2022 Sri Lanka’s struggle to shore up its crumbling economy continues, and there are no signs of promised foreign assistance materialising anytime soon. The Cabinet has just retained the services of some foreign firms for external debt restructuring, which is one of the main conditions for the IMF bailout package. When the […]