Author: TELO Admin

President Ranil Wickramasinghe has signed an Extraordinary Gazette notification declaring services related to supply of electricity, distribution of petroleum products and health care as essential services with immediate effect, President’s Media Division said.

Extraordinary Gazette notification has been issued by the Secretary to the President Saman Ekanayake, by order of the President Wednesday.

President Wickremesinghe, considering it necessary that the services provided by any state institution which is engaged in provision of the specified services, is essential to the life of the community and is likely to be impeded or interrupted, declared the services specified below to be an essential public service.

1. All services connected to the supply of electricity,
2. The supply or distribution of petroleum products and fuel,
3. All service, work or labor, of any description whatsoever, necessary or required to be done in connection with the maintenance, and the reception, care feeding, and treatment, of patients in hospitals, nursing homes, dispensaries, and other similar institutions.

Links between former President Mahinda Rajapaksa and controversial preachers Ubert Angel and Jerome Fernando is likely to be looked into as part of ongoing investigations launched by the authorities.

Fernando is being investigated over controversial statements he had made on Buddhism and other religions.

Investigators said that links between former President Mahinda Rajapaksa and Ubert Angel and Jerome Fernando will be looked into.

A complaint was lodged with the criminal investigations department over Prophet Jerome Fernando.

He was accused of making statements against the Buddhist community in Sri Lanka.

There are concerns Jerome Fernando was being used to create instability in the country.

Uebert Angel, who was in Sri Lanka in 2020 and 2022, to meet Prophet Jerome Fernando, had been accused in Zimbabwe of offering to use his status to launder millions of dollars through a gold-smuggling scheme.

Angel, appointed ambassador-at-large and a presidential envoy by Zimbabwe’s President Emmerson Mnangagwa in March 2021, told reporters he would be able to carry large volumes of dirty cash into the country using his diplomatic status.

An undercover operation by Al Jazeera’s Investigative Unit (I-Unit) had said he would facilitate a scheme through which unaccounted cash could be exchanged for Zimbabwe’s gold. Recipients of the gold could then sell the precious metal for legitimate money, effectively turning their cash clean.

The 44-year-old, who claims to be a prophet and heads a congregation — the Good News Church — with branches in 15 countries, and his business partner Rikki Doolan also claimed that their laundering operations had the approval of Mnangagwa, who has been in power since November 2017, when Zimbabwe’s controversial former leader Robert Mugabe was ousted in a military coup.

China should play a formal role in the common framework for creditor talks set up by India and the Paris Club that is aimed at facilitating Sri Lanka’s debt restructuring, a U.S. official said.

Sri Lanka defaulted on its foreign debt for the first time in its history last April as its economy faced its worst financial crisis in more than seven decades.

Key creditor Japan, along with France and India, last month set up the common framework for creditors to discuss and coordinate restructuring Sri Lanka’s debt, a model they hope can be extended towards other middle-income economies as well.

China, Sri Lanka’s largest bilateral lender, participated as an observer at the island’s first meeting of creditor nations earlier in May, raising hope among policymakers that Beijing will engage more in debt-resolution talks for low- and middle-income countries.

Participating in the platform is key to ensuring “debt restructuring happens on comparable terms,” Afreen Akhter, deputy assistant secretary in the U.S. government agency, the Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs (SCA), told Reuters.

“We very much believe the PRC should play a formal role in the creditor coordinator platform and, again, we really want to see all parties come to the table, equitably, to finalise this process.”

Sri Lanka owes $7.1 billion to its creditors, the latest government data shows, with $3 billion owed to China, $1.6 billion to India and $2.4 billion to the Paris Club, a group of major creditor nations.

Sri Lanka has set an ambitious target to complete its debt restructuring framework by September, in parallel with the first review of its $2.9 billion programme with the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

An IMF team on Monday said the country’s economy would contract 3 per cent in 2023.

The Working Committee of the Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) has unanimously approved a proposal put forward by General Secretary Ranjith Madduma Bandara and Sujeewa Senasinghe, officially naming Sajith Premadasa as the party’s next presidential candidate.

The decision was made during a crucial meeting held at the party headquarters.

The announcement comes as no surprise to political observers, as Sajith Premadasa has long been considered a prominent figure within the SJB and has consistently shown strong leadership qualities.

With this unanimous approval, Premadasa is now set to lead the party’s campaign for the upcoming presidential elections.

The Colombo High Court today (May 16) ordered the acquittal and release of Sivalingam Aruran, a defendant in the case related to the assassination attempt on then Defence Secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa in a suicide bombing at Pittala Junction in Kollupitiya in 2006.

Delivering the verdict, Colombo High Court Judge Navaratne Marasinghe stated that the court ruled that the confession given by the defendant to the Assistant Superintendent of Police under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) was not voluntary.

Accordingly, the Judge also mentioned that the relevant confession will be rejected by the court.

The judge, who ruled that the prosecution has not succeeded in proving the charge against the accused beyond a reasonable doubt, mentioned that the defendant will accordingly be acquitted and released from the case.

Furthermore, the court ordered that the case against Ponnasamy Karthigesu Sivaji, who was also accused in this case, be forwarded to Judge No. 01 of the Colombo High Court for hearing.

Aruran is a Tamil-language writer best known for winning the award for Best Independent Tamil Novel at the 65th State Literary Awards Ceremony while in his 16th year of detention under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA).

His novel ‘Aathurasalai’ was written entirely while at the Welikada Prison, after authorities arrested him in 2006.

In the wake of deploying military personnel in the vicinity of the University of Colombo on information received by intelligence agencies, Opposition Parliamentarian Prof. G.L. Peiris yesterday (15) claimed that Colombo City has now become a military camp as a result of the Government’s campaign to control the public voice which is raised against the conduct of the Government.

Speaking at a press conference held yesterday, Prof. Peiris urged the Opposition to come together in good faith against this inhumane conduct of the Government while achieving the common goals of the Opposition to defeat the Government’s efforts to bring unconstitutional laws such as the Anti-Terrorism Bill and the Central Bank Bill.

“Every Opposition party has its own agenda. But, in matters which are directly affecting the people in this country, the Opposition should come forward and take the responsibility to speak on behalf of the people. As a joint Opposition, we have been doing it now for several months by working together with all the Opposition parties to defeat the efforts of the Government to end the freedom enjoyed by the people. The best example is the way how the Opposition behaved when the Anti-Terrorism Bill was taken to the Parliament. As a result of that, now, the people can enjoy the freedom that they have been given by the Constitution,” he said

Prof. Peiris also noted that the postponement of the Anti-Terrorism Bill can be considered as a major victory of the joint Opposition as now the Government has temporarily withdrawn it, even without a date to table it to the Parliament.

“By looking at Colombo City these days, the people should understand the danger that could have been created by the proposed Anti-Terrorism Bill if it had been made a law because every repressive incident which is happening now is taking place even without such dangerous laws. In that sense, we must be very happy that all the Opposition parties said in one voice that this Bill should not be passed. It was a good example provided by us that the Opposition must work in order to prevent such dangerous laws being enacted,” he said.