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It was only India which helped Sri Lanka and Maldives when these countries were in distress while other countries were interested in finding business opportunities, RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat has said.

Spirituality is the “soul of India”, he said, addressing a program organized by Bharat Vikas Manch, an organization associated with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). “Spirituality is the soul of India. What does India need to do? It is to tell everyone how to live life on the basis of this spirituality through our own example,” he said. “Living life without ego” was the soul of India, he added. Countries like China, United States and Pakistan turned their attention to Sri Lanka when they saw business opportunities there, he said.

“But now when Sri Lanka is in trouble, who is extending help? It is only India. Who sent water to the Maldives when it was facing a water crisis? It was India which did. This is the spiritual India,” he said.

Talking about all-round development of personality, he said one should not eat the wrong kind of food. “If you eat the wrong (kind of) food, it will lead you on the wrong path. One should not eat ‘tamasik’ food. One should not eat food that involves too much violence,” Bhagwat said. There are people in India who eat meat as elsewhere in the world, but in our country even those who are non-vegetarian observe restraint and follow certain rules, he said. “People who eat non-vegetarian food here do not eat it during the entire month of Shravan. They do not eat it on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays or Saturdays. They impose some rules on themselves,” Bhagwat noted. (Courtesy PTI)

Japan has placed preconditions in order to support Sri Lanka’s debt issue.

Finance Minister Shunichi Suzuki said that Japan is prepared to “do its part” over Sri Lanka’s debt issue.

However, he said that other creditors, such as China and India, should also be involved in efforts to resolve it.

Suzuki made the remarks after meeting with President Ranil Wickremesinghe, the Kyodo news service reported.

The Japanese Finance Minister said that he urged Sri Lanka to provide the necessary information, make its own efforts to get China, India and other creditors involved and boost transparency.

“Japan will do its part if such preconditions are met,” Suzuki told reporters without elaborating in the Philippine capital Manila, where he attended a meeting of the Asian Development Bank.

During his visit to Japan, the Sri Lankan President met Wednesday with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and discussed the debt issue. The leaders recognized the importance of “fair and transparent” debt restructuring that involves all creditor nations, according to the Japanese Foreign Ministry.

Sri Lanka defaulted on its debt earlier this year. The COVID-19 pandemic added to the woes of the Asian nation, already struggling financially after taking out loans from countries such as China to develop its infrastructure.

In a speech at the annual meeting of the ADB’s board of governors, Suzuki said the COVID-19 pandemic and surging energy prices caused by Russia’s war in Ukraine have “heightened the risk of debt vulnerabilities.”

“All creditors should cooperate in providing support in a coordinated manner, while debtor countries undertake reform efforts towards achieving a sound level of debt,” Suzuki said, in an apparent reference to Sri Lanka.

Chairman of the Election Commission of Sri Lanka, Nimal Punchihewa says a draft Bill to regulate expenditure incurred by candidates at elections conducted under the Local Authorities Elections Ordinance, the Provincial Councils Elections Act, the Parliamentary Elections Act and the Presidential Elections Act’ drawn up by the Election Commission of Sri Lanka has been approved by the Attorney General and submitted to the President. If approved by the President, the Bill will be presented to Parliament for ratification.The need for regulating campaign finance has arisen as some candidates and political parties spend billions of rupees to ‘buy’ votes.

Both the People’s Action for Free and Fair Elections (PAFEREL) and the CMEV campaigned for regulating campaign finance and Manjula Gajanayake the National Coordinator of the Centre for Monitoring Election Violence (CMEV) at the time took the initiative to set up a special team to keep tabs on the colossal amounts political parties and candidates spent on their election campaigns.

Gajanayake said that the CMEV had spent 15 million rupees to monitor campaign finance at the 2019 Presidential Election and 2020 General Election. He said that the CMEV reports showed that approximately 7,800 million rupees had been spent at these two elections but it was just the tip of the iceberg.

Gajanayake said that Sirithunga Jayasuriya, who contested the 2019 Presidential Election and former MP Ranjan Ramanayake, who contested the 2020 Parliamentary Election, were the only candidates who had disclosed their campaign expenditure.

Gajanayake, who is currently the Executive Director of the Institute of Democratic Reforms and Electoral Studies (IRES), said that IRES would monitor campaign spending at future elections. He said that the Election Commission of Sri Lanka should set up a special committee to review the maximum amount each candidate and political party could spend on their campaign at each election and added that it was imperative that the source of funding was disclosed and spending made transparent.He said that laws should be introduced to unseat anyone found guilty of spending over and above the stipulated ceiling; introducing a regulatory mechanism to control campaign finance would undoubtedly change the Sri Lankan election landscape in the future.

Sri Lanka’s inflation in the capital Colombo accelerated to 69.8 percent in September 2022 from 64.3 percent a month earlier, data from the state statistics office showed amid the worst currency crisis in the history of the island’s intermediate regime central bank.

The widely watched Colombo Consumer Price Index rose 3.8 percent to 244.7 points in the month.

The food sub-index rose 0.9 percent to 323.3 points.

Food prices were up 94.9 percent in the last 12 months. Food prices are up 120 percent from January 2020 when Sri Lanka began to print money aggressively after cutting taxes in December 2019.

Sri Lanka’s central bank has allowed interest rates to go up and private credit is now negative. Attempts are also made to minimize the budget deficit with high taxes and state enterprise credit is also contained with utility price hikes.

Sri Lanka operates Latin America style soft-peg with inherent anchor conflicts and triggering currency crises when attempts are made to suppress market interest rates.

Currency crises intensified from around 2014 when aggressive open market operations were unleashed to suppress rates in an ill-fated infaltion targeting exercise despite having a reserve collecting peg.

Sri Lanka cut taxes and printed large volumes of money to suppress rates in a ‘stimulus’ from 2020 ultimately driving the country to default.

Food prices are up 120 percent from January 2020 when Sri Lanka began to print money aggressively after cutting taxes in December 2019. Adding to the inflation is money printing by the Federal Reserve which had fired the highest price rises in 40 years.

Bad US and European policy in a resurgence of mercantilism also led to bad policy across countries.

Sri Lanka will seek a vote on an upcoming resolution at the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) with the help of its friends as the resolution is “unfair” and aimed at tarnishing the country’s image at a time of economic crisis, Foreign Minister Ali Sabry said.

The new resolution is likely to tighten Sri Lanka’s space to deal with international trade further as several key conventions in trade concessions like Europe’s GSP Plus are tied directly to human rights. Already the European Union has threatened to withdraw its trade concession as the country has failed to fulfill its commitments on implementing some key international conventions.

The draft resolution, titled “Promoting reconciliation, accountability and human rights in Sri Lanka” and sponsored by the United Kingdom, the United States, Germany, Canada, Malawi, Montenegro and North Macedonia, was formally handed over to the Human Rights Council Secretariat last week.

The draft text requests the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights to enhance its monitoring and reporting on the situation of human rights in Sri Lanka, including on progress in reconciliation and accountability, and on the human rights impact of the economic crisis and corruption.

“It is unfair,” Foreign Minister Ali Sabry told EconomyNext on Thursday September 29.

“It is against our constitution and we have to respond to that. We are not going to agree on that. Whether we will win or lose, there are things on which we cannot compromise. We will ask for a vote through our friends,” he said.

Sri Lanka has been strongly against an external evidence gathering mechanism by the Office of High Commissioner for Human Rights though the UN body has already started the mechanism despite facing a lack of finance initially.

Sri Lanka’s human rights record has been criticised widely since the final stage of a 26-year civil war that ended in 2009 due to the alleged killing of thousands of ethnic minority Tamils by government forces. The government of Sri Lanka has repeatedly denied the allegation.

Some Western nations have already imposed a travel ban on some military leaders who led the government’s war effort on the grounds of alleged crimes. Canada and Germany had refused to accommodate Sri Lankan military officials in the island nation’s diplomatic missions in those countries.

Minister Sabry said the resolution is a concern because it seeks long term prosecution of military officials.

“Particularly what we are concerned about is an outside evidence gathering mechanism and the long-term prosecution of Sri Lankan armed forces outside Sri Lanka. That we cannot agree with,” he said.

The new resolution has called upon the government to address Sri Lanka’s ongoing currency crisis including by investigating corruption and prosecuting those responsible including public and former public officials. It has asked the UNHCR to stand ready to assist and support independent, impartial, and transparent efforts on this.

“They have brought in some economic crimes which has not been defined. Many countries have gone through (economic crises). But what is the UNHRC doing about an economic crisis?” said Sabry.

“If there is a crime, we have to prosecute in Sri Lanka. Economic recovery must take place in Sri Lanka and the international community should support us. So, tarnishing our image at this point in time will have a negative impact. People will not want to work with us and no new people want to come and invest,” he said.