March 11, Colombo (LNW): President Ranil Wickremesinghe in his capacity as the Minister of Finance has issued a gazette notification authorising the import and re-export of various spices, including pepper, ginger, nutmeg, and turmeric.
The gazette announcement outlines that pepper, nutmeg, mace, cardamom, ginger, turmeric, and other spices may be imported with the approval of the Controller General of Imports and Exports.
Importers are required to add a minimum local value of 35 per cent before re-exporting the spices.
March 11, Colombo (LNW): The government facilitated the return of 109.56 acres of land, previously held by the military, to the lawful proprietors in the Jaffna peninsula, marking the 24th consecutive release of such properties.
The returned lands encompass five parcels in the Jaffna District and seven in the Kilinochchi District, the Sri Lanka Army said.
At present, only 0.5 per cent of the land remains under military occupation, designated as vital for upholding normalcy and ensuring security within the region.
This initiative reflects the ongoing commitment of the Sri Lankan government to restore occupied lands to their rightful owners.
Under the leadership of Commander of the Army, Lieutenant General Vikum Liyanage, and the oversight of Commander of the Security Forces – Jaffna, Major General Chandana Wickramasinghe, the process continues.
The event saw the participation of Sagala Ratnayake, Chief of Staff to the President and National Security Advisor, who attended as the Chief Guest.
March 11, Colombo (LNW): Leader of the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) and the National Peoples Power (NPP) MP Anura Kumara Dissanayake is set to visit Canada, based on an invitation extended by the Canadian branch of the NPP.
The NPP Leader will visit Canada on March 23 and 24 and public gatherings are scheduled to take place in Toronto on 23 and Vancouver on 24.
March 11, Colombo (LNW): The employees of the Central Mail Exchange in Colombo announced a 24-hour token strike commencing from midnight yesterday (10).
The United Postal Trade Unions Front (UPTUF) addressing a briefing yesterday elucidated that the strike action arises from the prolonged non-functionality of the building’s elevator, persisting for nearly a year.
They highlighted the significant challenges faced by approximately 40 per cent of female employees, including pregnant women, due to this issue.
Given that the Central Mail Exchange spans eight floors, maneuvering mail bags has become exceptionally burdensome.
If the government does not address the elevator repair within a month, the trade union action will persist, the UPTUF emphasised.
March 10, Colombo (LNW): The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) has officially accepted President Ranil Wickremesinghe’s invitation to opposition political parties for consultations with representatives of the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
As per the announcement by Illankai Tamil Arasu Kadchi (ITAK) leader S. Shritharan, TNA leader R. Sampanthan is set to partake in the forthcoming dialogue scheduled at the Presidential Secretariat today (11).
While invitations were extended to several opposition entities, it has been observed that both the Samagi Jana Balawega (SJB) and the National People’s Power (NPP) have chosen not to engage in the discussions.
Although the discussion was initiated following a request by SJB MP Harsha De Silva, Chairman of the Committee on Public Finance, his participation is pending confirmation.
March 11, Colombo (LNW): A few showers are likely in Eastern province and in Hambantota district, and showers or thundershowers may occur at a few places in Ratnapura, Kalutara, Galle and Matara districts in the evening or night, the Department of Meteorology said in its daily weather forecast today (11).
Mainly dry weather will prevail in the other areas of the island, the statement added.
Misty conditions can be expected at some places in Western, Sabaragamuwa and Uva provinces and in Galle and Matara districts during the morning.
Marine Weather:
Condition of Rain:
Showers or thundershowers may occur at a few places in the sea areas extending from Hambantota to Batticaloa via Pottuvil.
Winds:
Winds will be north-easterly and wind speed will be (20-30)kmph. Wind speed may increase up to (40-45) kmph at times in the sea areas off the coasts extending from Colombo to Kankasanthurai via Puttalam and Mannar and from Matara to Pottuvil via Hambantota.
State of Sea:
The sea areas off the coasts extending from Colombo to Kankasanthurai via Puttalam and Mannar and from Matara to Pottuvil via Hambantota can be fairly rough at times.
This deflection flies in the face of the facts. As Reuters reported in the first six weeks of the war, hospital morgues sent figures to the health centre which were then collated. Excel spreadsheets were used to keep track of names, ages and ID numbers, which were then transmitted to the Palestinian health ministry in Ramallah. As the aerial devastation continues it has become harder to keep track as vital infrastructure has been destroyed and health workers have been killed by the indiscriminate and sometimes targeted bombing.[i] It should be noted that the figures that were collated after earlier aerial bombardments were seen as accurate. In fact, the current figures could be a gross underestimate, as identifying bodies buried under tons of rubble has now become almost impossible.
Oxfam estimates that the Zionist military machine is killing 250 Palestinians a day with many more prone to hunger disease and cold, which could like in Lanka could kill many civilians. It is estimated that this carpet bombing of civilians is the highest daily figure for wars anywhere in the world in the last 24 years. Even the horrific Syrian conflict (96 deaths per day) Sudan (51.6) Iraq (50.8). It is considerably greater than the carnage in Ukraine (43.9) and trouble plagued Yemen (15.8)[ii]
Amnesty International early in the conflict began collating and analysing data from satellite imagery, verified photos, and investigated air bombardment carried out by the Zionist forces between October 7 to 12 and investigated five cases of bombing which wiped out whole families. It came to the conclusion in each of these cases internal international humanitarian law was violated by a failure to distinguish between civilian and military targets.
In their stated intent to use all means to destroy Hamas, Israeli forces have shown a shocking disregard for civilian lives. They have pulverised street after street of residential buildings killing civilians on a mass scale and destroying essential infrastructure, while new restrictions mean Gaza is fast running out of water, medicine, and electricity.
It has decimated whole families, leaving only memories and rubble in its wake.[iii] At the time of writing the death toll is over 26,000, with around 60,000 wounded and the vast majority facing starvation and lack of water, medicine and shelter. This continual pressure and the lack of a political and economic solution makes the possibility of a non-violent response fade by the day.
What makes a person join the LTTE or Hamas? In Jaffna, which was under the control of the Sinhalese military, a mother of a female member of their elite Black Tiger Unit observed: ‘We could not separate ourselves from the war. We lived inside it’.[iv].
For many there is an intergenerational perspective on whether to just survive or fight back. As the mother of the cadre said: ‘When a child experiences too much sadness it can feel no more. We tolerate and bear everything. Not all children accept suffering.’ Her daughter: ‘Father was killed in the middle of Jaffna town. He is going to work in the post office, he was a peon. If I did not join, people will be pushed into slavery.’
Critics can dispassionately point out that at the time she made the statement there had been well over 300 suicide missions. These missions caused deaths and terror and hardened opposing opinion. But what good would such a hectoring, patronising and rarified tone achieve? Instead of labelling her a terrorist and a fanatic, we must first try and empathise with her very real sorrow, pain and sense of injustice and lack of rights. Like the millions of people around the world who march in solidarity with the Palestinians all one can do is listen to the sorrow, pain, her very real sense of injustice and lack of rights. These are important matters which we must first deal with, instead of imposing labels on the marginalised and the dispossessed. To do so the respective unitarist states of Lanka and Israel must be democratised from the “river to the sea” with equal rights for all. If this is not done the vicious cycles of brutal discrimination, atrocities and horrific counter offenses becomes the norm. Context is everything and the above narrative begs the question who are the real terrorists?
Conclusion
The International Court of Justice (ICJ) in a judgement of 15 to 2 against the Zionist state stated that there is a plausible case for genocide against Palestinians. The targeting of civilians, hospitals, schools, UN compounds, mosques, universities buttress the case. The ICJ also argued that statements made by the current Israeli president and members of cabinet, combined with the actions of the military, can be construed as genocidal intent. The beleaguered prime minister Netanyahu then let the cat out of the bag and unequivocally stated that from the river to the sea the land is for Jewish Zionists only. Both these statements have put the Zionist project in Palestine under a critical microscope. Miraculously, after this expose, the Zionist state came up with evidence that twelve workers from United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNWRA) were involved in the October 7 attacks. Immediately, and without assessing the evidence, Australia, Britain, and the US withdrew aid, taking no account of the fact that UNWRA has sacked nine of the accused and has started an investigation. As mentioned, around 80 per cent of the population of Gaza are facing imminent starvation and their principal food source is UNWRA. The fact is that many of the claims that Israel has made about Palestinians are demonstrably false, not to mention the fact that it makes no sense to attack an organisation that employs around 13,000 people because of the alleged crimes of twelve of their workers. Barely mentioned is the fact that settler fanatics are trying to block vital food going to Gaza.[v] The Zionist state is yet to provide evidence to support their claims and the western countries who have withdrawn funding seem in no hurry to get the evidence unlike the UN.
Sadly, the majority of Israelis, if opinion polls are anything to go by, support the crushing of the Palestinians. But cracks in the “rules-based order” are starting to appear. Many senior bureaucrats and journalists in the West have signed a letter deploring their countries’ double standards when it comes to Israel.[vi]
In Sri Lanka, in 2022, it was clear that the economy was collapsing. The government had to go cap in hand to the International Monetary Fund to bail out the country. For many Lankans this was an eye-opener, as they discovered that the existential threat of the Tamils was not the cause of their misery. It was a combination of political and bureaucratic incompetence combined with corruption. Since being granted independence in 1948 the country has never been able to pay for its imports or expand its industrial base to a degree that could make the country economically viable. Instead, the politicians kept on borrowing, resulting in periodic crisis.
This time a group of young people coalesced in loose affiliations demanding the resignation of the government and structural change. This became known as the Aragalaya (the struggle in Sinhalese). It morphed into a mass protest movement and toppled the then President, forcing him to flee the country. This mass movement was open to all, but its loose structure was not a match for the state. Parliament appointed as an interim President a wily operator who had decades of experience in quelling protest and shifting the gaze of the populace to manufactured enemies. This he gradually did again, with arrests, imprisonment, and thuggery, aided by the legislative, administrative, and constitutional armoury built over decades to evade scrutiny and accountability. This suite of powers had been traditionally used against Tamils, left wing parties, journalists, civil rights activists, and trade unionists. It was now being used on ordinary people who might have in the past supported measures against what they presumed to be the ‘other’. An election will be held later this year and the disgraced political elite are preparing to return to power, blaming foreigners, minorities, and progressive political formations for the crisis which they themselves clearly caused. They seem to be clawing back some of their supporters, though whether they will succeed is still an open political question. [vii]
With regard to both the Zionist and the Lankan state, the international community has, for strategic, commercial, and political reasons, been lax and gullible. Neither the Zionist nor the Lankan state has ever been prevailed upon to change its behaviour. For how long is the international community[viii] going to accept their assurances (extending over decades) that they are democratic states and their enemies are the terrorists? For killing of the ‘others’ on an industrial scale and herding them into ghettos, the Zionist and Lankan states should both be in the dock.
10 March 2024
[i] Sawafta, Ali and Fick, Maggie, ‘How many Palestinians have died in Gaza? Death Toll explained’. Published December 9, 2023. Retrieved: https:// www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/how-many-palestinians–have-died-gaza-war-how-will-counting-continue.
[ii] ‘Daily Death Rate in Gaza higher than any other major 21st century conflict.’ Oxfam Press Release, 11 January 2024. Retrieved: https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/daily-death-rate-gaza-higher-any-other-major-21st-century-conflict-oxfam
[iii] ‘Damning Evidence of war crimes as Israeli attacks wipe out entire families in Gaza.’ Amnesty, October 2023. Retrieved: https:// www.amnesty.org.latest news, 2023.10
[iv] All the conversations are from the documentary, Arnestad, B. and Daae, M. (2007) My daughter the terrorist. Snitt film Production.
[vi] ‘Grave Violations’: Western officials in unprecedented Gaza protest. The New Daily, February 2, 2024.
[vii] For a good overview see Dr Lionel Bopage’s recent interview on 3CR with Green Left Weekley Radio. The podcast is available at: https://www.3cr.org.au/greenleftweekleyradio/episode/behind-weapons-industry-australia-economic-crisis-sri-lanka-sovereignty.
[viii] It should be noted that the main backer of the Lankan state is China. In the UN the main countries blocking any change also include Russia, Cuba, and Venezuela. On the opposite camp are the ardent supporters of the Zionist state, Australia, Britain and the United States.
March 10, Jaffna (LNW): Sevithi Sai Murali, the Deputy High Commissioner of India in Sri Lanka, undertook a visit to the “DP Education IT Campus” branch situated in Nelliadi, Jaffna, on the 9th of the current month.
This branch currently facilitates computer language education for 600 students.
The Jaffna district is served by a total of nine DP Education IT campus centres, with operational branches located in Nelliadi, Udupitti, Nallur, Vadukottai, and Thellipalai.
Additionally, branches in Velanai, Chavakachcheri, Kopai, and Uduvil are currently under construction and are slated to commence operations shortly.
These nine DP Education IT Campus centers in the Jaffna District are established through a collaboration between the “My Dream Academy” programme led by the Deputy Chairman of Parliament and Jaffna District MP, Angajan Ramanathan, and DP Education.
High Commissioner of India, H.E Santosh Jha became the first Indian High Commissioner in recent times to undertake a standalone visit to Southern Province, as he held diverse engagements in Galle, Matara and Hambantota Districts on 6-7 March 2024.
2. High Commissioner met Governor of the Province, Hon. Dr. Willie Gamage on 6 March 2024 and highlighted several projects undertaken by Government of India (GOI) in the region. High Commissioner also expressed willingness to carry out more projects for the benefit of the people in the Province through grant assistance as well as investments. Hon. Governor thanked the High Commissioner for GOI’s diverse initiatives.
3. High Commissioner paid floral tributes at the bust of Rabindranath Tagore, installed in the auditorium named after Gurudev Tagore in University of Ruhuna. With a seating capacity of 1500 people, this is the largest auditorium in any Sri Lankan University. It may be recalled this facility, built through GOI grant assistance, was inaugurated in 2018. During an interactive session with the Vice Chancellor and faculty heads of the University, High Commissioner expressed interest in closer educational collaborations and conveyed willingness to further support the University in multiple ways.
4. GOI is currently implementing two dedicated housing projects, covering around 50 villages in Galle, Matara and Hambantota Districts. GOI has committed to build 1200 housing units for the homeless, landless and low-income people under these two projects. High Commissioner visited two villages in Hambantota District to take stock of progress of these two project sites.
5. High Commissioner’s visit to Southern Province underscored the enduring cultural linkages between India and Sri Lanka. High Commissioner sought the blessings of Lord Buddha at the sacred Dondra, Katragama and Tissamaharama Temples and prayed for further strengthening of ties between the people of India and Sri Lanka.
Education State Minister Arvindh Kumar emphasises the importance of the “Presidential Scholarship” programme proposed by President Ranil Wickremesinghe: highlights that this initiative, geared towards supporting one hundred thousand students during the 2024/2025 academic year, holds immense potential to provide crucial assistance to economically disadvantaged students.
Opposition Leader Sajith Premadasa says regardless of the claim that the country has returned to normalcy, the electricity bill has increased by 500 – 600%, the water bill has soared, cost of living has surged, people are losing their jobs, and factories are being closed: laments the President’s ‘new normal’ is the norm of creating sorrows for the people.
President Ranil Wickremesinghe’s first mass rally is scheduled to be held today at Kuliyapitiya Municipal Council: Organised by the former UNP General Secretary Akila Kariyawasam, the event is the first propaganda rally for the party aiming the upcoming elections.
The Inland Revenue Department launches a ‘High Wealth Individuals Unit’ (HWIU) at the Large Taxpayer Office to enforce tax compliance among wealthy individuals: The unit will provide support to ensure accurate tax filings and conduct audits on high-risk cases.
Deputy Director of the National Hospital and GMOF president Dr. Rukshan Bellana criticises recent police arrests of fresh medical graduates assisting registered doctors, contrasting with the lack of action against unlicensed quack doctors: highlights the importance of supervised practice for new graduates and urges authorities to target actual quacks, not aspiring doctors gaining experience.
Health authorities warn of a rising rabies risk due to the lack of a proper programme to control the country’s free-roaming dog population: With over six million stray dogs nationwide and crippled sterilisation efforts, authorities fear a health and social crisis: Sixteen deaths from dog bites last year underscore the urgency for effective control measures.
The government amends the Declaration of Assets and Liabilities Law to enhance transparency and combat corruption: High-ranking officials, judges, military personnel, election officials, and others are now required to disclose their financial information: A central electronic system to facilitate the declaration process: Revised declaration forms are available on the Bribery or Corruption Allegations Investigation Commission’s website, and officials must submit their declarations promptly.
SLIC transfers its insurance operation to two new subsidiaries, SLIC General Limited and SLIC Life Limited, becoming a holding company: Alvarez & Marsal, along with Capital Alliance, will advise on the divestiture of the government’s shareholding in SLIC as part of Sri Lanka’s reform program: Five bidders, including local and global firms, respond to the Request for Qualification (RfQ) for the sale of SLIC’s life and general insurance businesses: Evaluation will follow guidelines approved by the Cabinet of Ministers.
Residents of Ottawa and the local Sri Lankan community hold a solemn vigil on Saturday to honour the victims of a tragic mass killing, one of the city’s worst in recent memory: Attendees, including Mayor Mark Sutcliffe and the Sri Lankan High Commissioner, pay tribute to a mother, her four children, and a family friend who lost their lives: A 19-year-old Sri Lankan national faces charges related to the deaths.
Sri Lanka wins T20i series against Bangladesh by 2-1.
