A ‘manifesto’ prepared by the Federation of University Teachers’ Associations (FUTA) will be distributed to participants at various rallies to be held in Colombo on May Day, according to its President. Speaking to The Nation, FUTA President Dr Nirmal Ranjith Dewasiri said the manifesto would explain FUTA’s stance on the ‘crisis affecting the country’s education sector’. He added the document was currently being prepared and would be distributed on May 1.

“We are planning to assem

wo senior journalists, Hemachandra Nanayakkara (80) and M. C. A. Hassan (81) passed away this week.�Mr. Nanayakkara who died on Tuesday after a brief illness received his education at the Jaffna Sinhala Maha Vidyalaya while living with his businessman uncle in the northern capital. He was trilingual and began his professional career in 1955 as Jaffna Correspondent for the then ‘Times of Ceylon’ Group.

He was also a Provincial Correspondent for the Virakesari newspaper and then became Galle Group Correspondent for

The government is to acquire a large area of land in Vavuniya to build a permanent military camp.
According to the Ministry of Land and Land Development, the owners of the land located in close proximity to the A9 highway have already been informed of this move.

The Ministry says the land acquisition is being carried out legally and the owners will be compensated accordingly.
Tamil political parties had raised objections to the presence of army camps in the North following the end of the war.

The mother of a sick child at Lady Ridgeway Hospital says that she was asked to remove her ‘abaya’ (cloak) when she visited the hospital to see her child.

The mother, whose child was diagnosed with dengue fever, visited Lady Ridgeway Hospital on April 13 at around 9.30 p.m.
At the time she visited the hospital she said the nurse on duty at the Admission desk had asked her to remove her abaya if she wanted to enter the hospital premises.

Not even the Greek tragedies have been as spectacular in unraveling horrors, pathos, and innumerable nuances which ties up the plot in so many complex sub plots as in the case of Sri Lanka since May 2009. Sri Lanka unfortunately seems to have had the penchant to overlook the soft seductive peace that came wafting into the country immediately after May 19, 2009.

The government last week condemned the moves of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) calling on India to press Sri Lanka for an interim administration in a merged North and Eastern provinces. And, reiterated that such mechanisms should be discussed with the regime and not outside entities.

The TNA recently urged India to press the government to establish an interim administration in the North and East that should be monitored by India or the UN. The call was made when the TNA flanked by Bishop of Mannar Most Rev. Rayappu Joseph m

The US State Department’s report on human rights states that attacks on and harassment of civil society activists, LTTE sympathizers and journalists is creating an environment of fear and self-censorship in Sri Lanka.

The U.S. State Department in its “Country Reports On Human Rights Practices” for 2012, highlights “involuntary disappearances” as well as a lack of accountability for thousands who disappeared in previous years.

Although the overall number of extrajudicial killings appeared to decrease from previous years, killings and assaults on civilians by government officials continued in 2012, the United States said in a report released Friday.

The 2012 Human Rights Report released by the United State Department of State yesterday alleged that the government, its agents, or its paramilitary allies committed arbitrary or unlawful killings, but said, reliable statistics on such killings were difficult to obtain, because past complainants were kill

Executive Director of a Colombo-based think tank says the decision taken by the United States Department of State to reduce the aid amount for Sri Lanka will not affect the country's development.

Executive Director of Institute of Policy Studies Dr. Saman Kelegama says that the proposed 20 percent American aid cut to Sri Lanka is insignificant since US aid only given to Sri Lanka's non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and civil society sector and not to the government.

A Buddhist priest from Thailand has been taken into custody in Rameswaram, Tamil Nadu as he was attempting to illegally leave for Sri Lanka via Dhanushkodi, police said.

B J Emurai, who came to India recently to pursue his P.hD, had arrived at Rameswaram yesterday and planned to go to Dhanushkodi en route to Sri Lanka when he was arrested.