Apr 10 (GDI) In order to provide the people of over 1800 families living in Delft Island with uninterrupted electricity power supply, the Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) with the greater assistance of the Sri Lanka Navy has provided a 250 Kilo Volts electric generator. As a response to a recent request made by the civilians living in Delft Island the CEB has provided the generator which was transferred to the island by the Navy from Kankasanthurai. more..

Apr 10 (GDI) The Q branch of the Tamil Nadu (TN) Police arrested on Monday (09), three LTTE Sea Tiger cardres staying in as refugees at the Mandapam Transit camp in Ramanathapuram, Rameswaran of Southern India. The TN Police have stated that it was revealed that these Sea Tigers were members of the LTTE intelligence wing. According to reports from India the suspects were identified as Devajotheeswaran (24), Sugandan (22) and Justin Raj (23). more..

Apr 10 (GDI) The Sri Lankan leg of the SAARC Car Rally, conducted in conjunction with the 14th SAARC Summit in New Delhi started today. The Sri Lanka leg of the SAARC Rally will cover a distance of 900 km covering Lankan beaches, landscapes and historical cities from April 10 to 12. The Rally was flagged off from the Galle Road near the Taj Samudra this morning and it will reach Tissamaharama. more..

Apr 10 (GDI) President Mahinda Rajapaksa pointed out that his government has created a record as the first ever stable Government with the highest majority in parliament since the Government of 1989 which had 125 Government MPs. There are 121 Government MPs under the present administration. The government has the support of a large number of political parties represented in the Parliament. more..

Apr 10 (GDI) 'Selling dreams' - this is a very important aspect of tourism development. The average tourist visiting Sri Lanka puts his hard-earned money into being delighted from beginning to end during his encounter with Sri Lanka. That is, he has a joyful 'dream' to be fulfilled in Sri Lanka. It is the obligation of every stakeholder in the tourism industry in this country to make this dream come true, more..

Apr 10 (PISL) Chief Justice Sarath N. Silva said he was confident that the new set of Constitutional reforms to be presented by President Mahinda Rajapakse would douse the flames of war and pave the way for peace. Speaking after declaring open the new Buddhist Shrine room and the computer network at the Anuradhapura Magistrate Court complex on Saturday (7), he said Constitutional reforms were necessary to end the war and rebuild confidence among all ethnic groups. more..

Apr 10 (ISL) The civilized community never permits the killing of innocent persons. The LTTE attack on the passenger bus at Vavuniya Parayanankulam on 07.04 2007 is a cruel act. Five innocent persons, a Rev. Father and an unarmed soldier were killed in this merciless attack. 26 persons including children were injured in this incident. These murderers are aimless ruthless men who are not aware of answers to questions like why and for what purpose they execute things. more..

Apr 10 (KT) IT'S holiday season in Sri Lanka. Shops in Colombo and other major cities are kept open till late into the night to allow people to buy clothes, shoes, food items and other necessities in preparation for the upcoming New Year. On April 13 and 14, when the sun moves from the Meena Rashiya (House of Pisces) to the Mesha Rashiya (House of Aries) in astrological terms, more..

Apr 10 (LNP) The voice of Sri Lanka against terrorism was unanimously endorsed by all SAARC countries who proposed that terrorism should be condemned in all its forms and manifestations, Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama said yesterday. Addressing the media on Sri Lanka`s role at the 14th SAARC summit, Bogollagama said the Lankan delegation emphasised that there can be no social and economic progress without peace and security. more..

Apr 10 (LNP) Prisoners will soon have to do without their beef curry at meal time. Commissioner General of Prisons Vajira Abeygunawardena said yesterday (9) that the consumption of beef daily by prisoners had created health problems in the crowded prisons and an awareness campaign for the prisoners on the subject would be launched soon. In future fish and other animal fat protein food will be given to the prisoners. more..

Apr 10 (LNP) Sri Lanka Foreign Secretary Palitha Kohona who is also the Secretariat for Coordinating the Peace Process (SCOPP) in Sri Lanka is now in Australia to seek the latter`s support to ban the LTTE in Australia. LTTE is waging war against the Sri Lankan government to establish a separate state in the north and east provinces of Sri Lanka for minority Tamils. more..

Apr 10 (LNP) Over 2.5 million patients had been treated at the Colombo National Hospital`s Out Patients Department last year, its Director Dr. Hector Weerasinghe said. The hospital has performed 80,000 operations out of which 1,004 were major operations, he said. The total cost of these major operations, if done privately, would have cost patients over Rs. 400 million, he said. more..

Apr 10 (SAMN) The plight of thousands of displaced people in Batticaloa continues to worsen with camps not getting adequate food supplies while the tents are drenched by torrential rain that has been pouring down during the past two days. According to residents despite repeated government assurances there have not been any new food supplies coming in to the area and each person, who had been used to three meals a day, is now forced to survive on 100 to 200 grams of rice a day. more..

Apr 10 (SAMN) The long-standing paddy marketing problems of farmers never seems to go away and in the Polonnaruwa district the JVP and ruling party politicians continue to trade accusations regarding alleged political interference in the process. The Divisional Coordinating Meeting of Hingurakgoda which met Monday to discuss the paddy purchasing process, turned stormy after more..

Apr 10 (SAMN) The main Opposition UNP said Monday it was doubtful whether the SLFP would come up with its devolution proposals by May 1 because of diverse views among government parties and allies. UNP MP Johnston Fernando told a news conference his party had these doubts because some of the SLFP�s allies were against power devolution. more..

Apr 10 (SAMN) The Healthcare and Nutrition Ministry will soon make arrangements to provide special authorisation to all local journalists to obtain specialised medical consultation and treatment without going through normal procedures, Healthcare and Nutrition Ministry sources said. This will be arranged under the direction of Healthcare and Nutrition Minister Nimal Siripala de Silva, they said. more..

Apr 10 (DN) The Government has arranged to develop four thousand villages with the launching of the Gama Neguma programme on March 29. All development activities in these villages will be completed by December 31, said Presidential Secretariat Co-ordinating Secretary Bandara Weerasinghe. He was addressing a conference attended by Kegalle district correspondents at the Kegalle kachcheri auditorium recently. more..

Apr 10 (DN) There is a dearth of qualified persons for jobs. Although many job opportunities are available in the country. Therefore the majority of youth has to suffer without jobs. Due to this the Government has taken action to initiate several vocational training centres on district level, said Provincial Councils and Local Government Minister Janaka Bandara Tennakoon. more..

Apr 10 (DM) The Parliamentary Select Committee on Electoral Reforms has virtually finalised its recommendations and will be meeting on April 24 with a view to completing its report, its Chairman Dinesh Gunawardena said yesterday. Minister Gunawardena told the Daily Mirror three major UNP proposals would be incorporated into the set of recommendations. more..

Apr 10 (DM) Opposition Leader Ranil Wickremesinghe said yesterday that the LTTE couldn�t be weakened by disappearances. �If the government thinks that the LTTE can be weakened by abducting people, it is mistaken,� he said. Mr. Wickremesinghe made this point at a meeting organized by the Civil Monitoring Commission (CMC) on disappearances and killings in Colombo yesterday. more..

Apr 10 (NZH) Two children stand on the roadside staring into the thick darkness of a banana plantation, their slender shoulders drooping from the weight of ammunition around their necks. Their eyes betray unadulterated terror, and the younger one, no more than 13, looks close to tears. Towards the jungle, across from the bleak strip of peninsula that separates the town of Batticaloa from the Sri Lanka mainland, comes the penetrating thud of shells from government field-guns. more..

Apr 10 (AFP) Sri Lankan cricket authorities said on Tuesday they had not been informed of a reported decision by coach Tom Moody to quit after the World Cup and return to Australia. "He told us that his focus was only on the World Cup and he will be talking to us after the World Cup," Sri Lanka Cricket official K Mathivanan told AFP. more..

Apr 10 (AP) Tamil Tiger rebels fired mortars at a military post in northern Sri Lanka on Tuesday, killing one soldier and wounding two others ahead of New Year celebrations, the Defense Ministry said. The military fired back, but it was not immediately known whether the insurgents suffered any casualties in the violence at Omanthai, on the border between government and rebel-held areas, more..

Apr 10 (HN) Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama flew into India in the third week of March for two days of meetings with government and opposition leaders. It was his second visit to India since January. He was accompanied by his no-nonsense Foreign Secretary Palitha Kohona. They came from the US, where Bogollagama made it clear that the international players overseeing his country�s barely alive peace process will have to change the way they looked at the Sri Lankan conflict. more..

Apr 10 (AFP) Tamil Tiger rebels shelled government military positions across a de facto frontline in northern Sri Lanka on Tuesday, killing one soldier and wounding three, the defence ministry said. The LTTE fired mortars at army positions at Omanthai, the unofficial border between the government and Tiger-controlled parts of the island, the ministry said. more..

Apr 10 (AFP) Tamil Tiger rebels Tuesday backed an Amnesty International campaign to shame Sri Lanka's government during the cricket World Cup and said it should be extended to a full sporting boycott of the island. The London-based rights watchdog has been asking Sri Lanka to improve its rights record and has urged thousands of fans in the Caribbean to sign special white cricket balls marked "play by the rules." more..

Apr 10 (HT) A van belonging to the Indian High Commission in Colombo was hijacked and its driver abducted, beaten and then released over Monday night and Tuesday morning, a mission official told HindustanTimes. Driver S Vishvanathan, a Tamil of Indian origin but a Sri Lankan national, was on his way to the Bandaranaike International Airport in Katunayake 30 km away, on routine airport duty, more..

Apr 10 (AFP) Scene of accident in Induruwa, south of Colombo. At least 23 people died and 57 others were injured when a crowded bus and a truck loaded with beer collided in southern Sri Lanka. more..

Apr 10 (AP) A passenger bus collided with a beer delivery truck and burst into flames Tuesday in southern Sri Lanka, killing at least 23 people and injuring 56, a police official said. The state-run bus was traveling from the southern city of Galle to the capital Colombo when it collided with the beer truck traveling in the opposite direction, local police chief Jayantha Gamage said. No foreign tourists were among the victims. more..

Apr 11 (FL) "THE borders of Sri Lanka are Point Pedro and Devinuwara in the north and south, Batticaloa and Colombo in the East and West. The terrorists are attempting to shoot their way into the heart of Sri Lanka through the borders of what they call Eelam. If we do not occupy the border, the border will come to us. We intend to act before they succeed," thus spoke President J.R. Jayewardene on February 20, 1985, in his speech at the opening session of Sri Lanka's Parliament. more..

Apr 11 (LeN) Opposition leader Ranil Wickremesinghe says, the government which has secret deals with the LTTE and won elections by paying them to purchase in return which the LTTE used to purchase air craft, should stop abducting Tamil innocent businessmen. Speaking during a function in Colombo yesterday he said though the President and the IGP keep on denying about the abductions one could see how many have been abducted if you walk around Colombo. more..

Apr 11 (LeN) It is being reported that Former minister Mangala Samaraweera will not have to appear before a disciplinary committee. It has been confirmed since Sri Lanka Freedom party general secretary has not handed him over a charge sheet. But he was charged with disciplinary breeches during a central committee meeting. more..

Apr 11 (LeN) Former minister of Ports Development Sripathi Surriarachchi has been accused with six charges by the Sri Lanka Freedom Party. Suriarachchi's charge sheet has been piled up with the signature of the Party general secretary Maithripala Sirisena. The charge sheet says Suriarachchi has violated one, many or all of the charges listed during the time between 9th February and 30th March. more..

Apr 11 (LeN) Naguleshwaran Selvaraja a businessman in Wellawaya and one of his employees have been abducted on the 6th of this month by a group that had arrived in a white colour van. The group had arrived at around 8 in the night and said that they needed to record a statement from the employee and that they were from the CID. more..

Apr 11 (AT) In a clarification to the �Asian Tribune,� Asset Media Pvt Ltd says that their subscribers are protected from unlawful Direct To Home transmissions of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. This clarification was sent in response to Asian Tribune�s news report of appeared on 08 April. The news report said that �Satellite based direct to home� television services a threat to national security. more..

Apr 11 (AT) The TMVP told the "AsianTribune" that the solution to present crisis is in designing a bi-cameral system of government and a constitution on the India model. Col. Karuna states: "The Indian constitution could be termed as a quasi-federal form of Government with strong unitary characteristics and tendencies. The Indian Constitution in my view portrays an appearance of a federal form in normal times but more..

Apr 11 (AT) Falk Rovik, a leading Norwegian anti-terrorist activist exposing Norway's role in supporting Tamil Tiger terrorism, will be the keynote speaker at a public seminar schduled to be held in Colombo on Apil 20, 2007. This seminar is organised by World Alliance for Peace in Sri Lanka (WAPS), Sansadaya and Norwegians Against Terrorism (NAT). more..

Apr 11 (BBC) An anti-drug authority in Sri Lanka says that the usage of drugs has not been increased in recent years. National Dangerous Drugs Control Board said the usage drastically increased since the introduction of open economic policies in 1977. However, certain reports on a recent increase of drugs usage are not scientific, Acting Executive Director K Gamage told BBC Sandeshaya. more..

Apr 11 (AP) Pakistan and Sri Lanka will play a series of three one-day international matches in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, next month, a top official of the Pakistan Cricket Board said Tuesday. "We have to work out some modalities with the Abu Dhabi Cricket Association and it will be done in due course of time before the series is organized next month," more..

Apr 11 (NDTV) The LTTE in Sri Lanka have emerged as the sole voice if Tamil militancy by systematically eliminating all other Tamil rebel groups and giving a new meaning to killing the competition. On the walls of Doublas Devananda's office hangs the brutal legacy of the LTTE. His colleagues of the Eelam People's Democratic Party (EPDP), which he heads, have been killed by the LTTE over the years. more..

Apr 11 (FH) The serious human rights abuses and excessive restrictions on freedom of speech and association by the government of Sri Lanka merit the country�s removal from a list of eligible recipients for Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) assistance, Freedom House said today. In 2004, Sri Lanka met eligibility requirements for funding from the MCC. more..

Apr 11 (ND) Sri Lankan fastbowler Lasith Malinga returned to Grenada early yesterday afternoon after receiving medical treatment at the Eric Williams Medical Sciences Complex, Mt Hope on Easter Sunday night. During a telephone interview, Minister of Health John Rahael stated that he received a phone call from Grenada Minister of Works and Communication Clarice Modeste at about 6 pm on Sunday that Malinga was hurt and needed an urgent MRI test. more..

Apr 11 (AFP) Record-breaking fast bowler Lasith Malinga is doubtful for Sri Lanka's World Cup Super Eights clash against New Zealand on Thursday with an ankle injury. Malinga was not at Sri Lanka's practice session at Sagesse Park here Tuesday and afterwards skipper Mahela Jayawardene told AFP: "Lasith has an ankle problem and we'll assess it over the next couple of days. We're not sure he's 100 percent. more..

Apr 11 (LBO) An Indian real estate firm that entered the Sri Lankan property market plans to help foreign buyers beat a 100 percent transaction tax by arranging 99-year leases. Real Estate Bank of India (Lanka) Private Limited (REBI Lanka) also said they were raising funds abroad because of the high cost of finance here. more..

Apr 11 (LBO) Heightened security in the country has allowed authorities to nab more drug dealers and abusers last year with arrests climbing 69 percent, Sri Lanka's anti drug authority said. In 2006 the drug related arrests had increased to 47,000 and 34,000 related to cannabis, the head of the Dangerous Drugs Control Board K Gamage said. more..

Apr 11 (MoD) The people of Jaffna are getting ready to celebrate the Sinhala and Hindu New Year. The situation in Jaffna has significantly improved and it is much better than two months ago, Jaffna GA K. Ganesh told the `Daily News' yesterday. He said that since the private sector joined in transporting goods the prices of essential items and all other goods have decreased and most goods are available at reasonable prices almost on par with prices prevailing in the rest of the country. more..

Apr 11 (DT) Sri Lankan Customs authorities will now accept the �certificate of origin� issued by Trade Development Authority of Pakistan (TDAP) for the export of basmati rice to Sri Lanka under zero-duty facility. According to a TDAP official here Tuesday, the certificate of origin will be issued by the Authority on first-come-first-serve (FCFS) basis till the entire quantity (5500 tons of basmati rice) for the year 2007 is exhausted. more..

Apr 11 (TN) President Mahinda Rajapakse's brother and his senior political advisor, Basil Rajapakse, excluded Eastern province Tamil National parliamentarians representing the districts of Trincomalee, Batticaloa and Amparai, from a development conference held in the Sri Lankan Presidential Secretariat to discuss the development activities in the East. more..

Apr 11 (TN) "The President of Sri Lanka has chosen to dismiss the present disappearances as not worthy of local and international attention," said a resolution passed by Civil Monitoring Commission (CMC), which is engaged in monitoring involuntary disappearances, abduction, extra judicial killings and arbitrary arrests and detentions in Sri Lanka. more..

Apr 11 (LBO) A Sri Lankan brewer whose truck was involved in a fatal bus-truck crash on Tuesday, is offering cash to accident victims, an official said Wednesday. Local brewer, Lion Brewery Ceylon Ltd, is offering to pay 125,000 rupees (1,200 dollars) to relatives for each of the victims who died, while those who survived will be paid 25,000 rupees (231 dollars), more..