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Thailand and Sri Lanka have recently agreed to increase cooperation on three issues concerning investment, tourism, and multilateral relationships. Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra met with Sri Lankan President His Excellency Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa on the occasion of his visit to Thailand to attend the Visakha Bucha Day celebration during May 31- June 2. Both leaders have discussed cooperation on three aspects, including (1) increasing trade and investments between the two nations, (2) promoting more cultural tourism in a form of combined destinations, and (3) strengthening regional cooperation. The details will be further discussed by a joint Thai-Sri Lankan committee consisting of foreign Ministers of both nations as representatives. The Sri Lankan President also offered to improve cooperation in jewelry industry, security, technological exchange, and the empowering women and children. He is glad that both nations’ citizens have developed a closer relationship; he is also h...

Indian Defence Secretary Pradeep Kumar says that the country will provide a large number of Sri Lankan defence personnel with opportunities to train in India in the future. During his meet with President Mahinda Rajapaksa today he also emphasized on the need to spread the current defence dialogues between the nations to ground and air forces. The Defence Secretary who is on a three-day visit to the Island nation with an aim to enhance defence ties between the two countries also expressed of the agreement to hold a joint naval exercise in Sri Lankan waters in 2011. He further revealed that the Indian Air Force plans to perform a display for the 60th anniversary of the Sri Lanka Air Force. (Pic courtesy President media)

A second annual conference to attract US investment to Sri Lanka will be held in Colombo Oct 12-14, giving business executives a chance to expand businesses in the island. The conference is organised by the Sri Lankan embassy in the US and the Office of the US Trade Representative, the US Department of Commerce, the US embassy in Colombo and the Sri Lanka Trade Ministry. “Our first conference last year gave people a good look at Sri Lanka, and the potential for businesses there,” said Jaliya Wickramasuriya, Sri Lanka’s ambassador to the US. “Now some of those businesses are planning to begin operations in Sri Lanka. We want to make sure that business people know the advantages of investing here,” he said. Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa met US investors during a business development luncheon last week. He explained to them the benefits of doing business with Sri Lanka. Those benefits include Sri Lanka’s free trade agreements with India and Pakistan that gives US businesses ...

The victory of President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s party in the Sri Lankan parliamentary elections is a good development for Indian national interest, Janata Party president Subramanian Swamy said. In a press statement, Dr. Swamy said it was a mandate necessary to enable the President to take “bold steps” to amend the Constitution and provide devolution of powers to Tamil areas of the north and the east. He called on the President not to “dissipate the national and international goodwill earned by defeating terrorism because of any undue delay in providing constitutional justice and equality to the Tamils of Sri Lanka.” The Hindu

At the request of the Sri lankan Minister of Foreign Affairs, the Saudi Arabian Embassy has issued free visas to 100 Sri Lankan Muslims proceeding on Umrah pilgrimage during the month of Ramazan for the first time. Earlier this month, several Muslim political leaders and organizations had drawn the attention of the Minister of Foreign Affairs to a change in the policy of the Saudi Arabian authorities, which resulted in cutting down the number of visas issued for prospective Umrah pilgrims from all over the world. In the past Saudi Arabia Authorities have issued visas to around 2000 applicants from Sri Lanka during the month of Ramazan, this time it had reduced to 1400 only. The Foreign Minister took up this matter with Saudi authorities through diplomatic channels. He also followed it up with representations to His Excellency Jammaz, Saudi Ambassador in Colombo . He emphasized to them the religious significance of Umrah for Muslims in the holly month of Ramazan and ...

President of the Republic of Maldives Mohamed Nasheed arrived at the Bandaranaike International Airport a short while ago.

Iranians re-elect Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as president with a resounding victory, taking a commanding lead in his bid for re-election with more than two-thirds of ballot boxes counted, Iran's interior ministry has said. With 80 per cent of the ballots counted on Saturday, the election commission put Ahmadinejad ahead with 63.8 per cent of the vote against 32.7 per cent for Mir Hossein Mousavi, his main rival. While his re-election was not a major upset, the scale of his first-round victory stunned his main challenger, Mirhossein Mousavi, whose campaign had drawn tens of thousands onto the streets of Tehran during three weeks of campaigning. Ahmadinejad won twice as many votes as Mousavi. "Doctor Ahmadinejad, by getting a majority of the votes, has become the definite winner of the 10th presidential election," the official IRNA news agency reported. After the declaration, the president's supporters took to the streets of Tehran, waving Iranian flags and honking car horns....

Reports from India suggests that President Mahinda Rajapaksa may take the opportunity of attending the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Scientific, Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) Summit to be held in New Delhi

The British Foreign Office has urged the LTTE to act urgently to allow free movement of civilians from the Wanni. "The recent increased hostilities in the north of Sri Lanka are of acute concern to the UK government," said junior Foreign Office minister Mark Malloch-Brown and aid minister Shahid Malik in a joint statement. "We welcome the government of Sri Lanka recognising its responsibility to provide humanitarian assistance to civilians affected by the conflict and its continued co-ordination with humanitarian agencies," they added. But they said: "We urge the LTTE to take urgent action to allow free movement of civilians. "We call on both parties to respect their obligations under international humanitarian law to enable free access for humanitarian agencies and the protection of civilians affected by the conflict," they added British Prime Minister Gordon Brown discussed the situation with Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse in New York on Fri...

Tourist arrivals from China to Sri Lanka grew by 7.3 percent in the first half of 2008 over the same period a year ago, SriLankan Airlines said in a statement.

President Mahinda Rajapaksa is to visit India shortly, Presidential sources said without divulging the reason for the trip.

The law pertaining to a mutual investment agreement between Iran and Sri Lanka which was approved by the Guardians Council has been notified to the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Finance of Iran for implementation, Iranian news agencies reported today (03). A report by the Public Relations Department of the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Finance on Wednesday said that based on the agreement, the two sides will strengthen economic cooperation and encourage and create necessary conditions for investment by nationals of the other side within the framework of their regulations. The agreement will be valid for 10 years, the report said, adding that following the expiry of the period, it can remain in force unless one of the parties seeks its termination in writing six months before the date it expires. The law on the agreement to support and encourage investment in the two countries contains an introduction, 13 articles and amended protocol, sources added.

The Permanent Mission of Sri Lanka to the United Nations in Geneva wishes to contradict several inaccuracies and distortions contained in a report in the London Daily Express, which seems to have been echoed by certain other news organizations, to the effect that Sri Lanka called for the abolition of the British monarchy. There was no such call, not by Sri Lanka and not by the UN Human Rights Council. Indeed the quote cited in the Daily Express does not include such a call. It recommends only that the UK 'consider' the holding of a referendum on the desirability or otherwise of a written constitution, preferably republican, with a bill of rights. The Daily Express has omitted the reference to a bill of rights. The entire matter is regarded as subject to the sovereign decision of the British people, and the recommendation is that the UK considers the ascertainment of their wishes by means of a referendum. It contains the further qualifier of 'the desirability or otherwise...

Reservoirs are like the arteries in our body. The sustenance of our nation was due to huge reservoirs and great irrigation works like the one we are launching today(April 29). We breathe life to our nation through these reservoir projects", the President Mahinda Rajapaksa was quoted as saying during his speech delivered on the occasion of the visit of the Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to Sri Lanka, at Sapugaskanda. "The Islamic people of the world have suffered immensely from war. We know that hundreds of thousands of our fraternal Muslims people live in refugee camps due to Israel - Palestinian war and other conflicts in the world. That is not all. The inhuman sufferings the Sri Lankan Muslims have undergone due to terrorism are not seen in many other countries. It includes the massacre of Muslims when they were praying to Almighty Allah at the Kattankudi Mosque; and the eviction of several thousand Muslims from the North in just 24 hours", the President further...