Editorial
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Coming as it did in the immediate aftermath of a hard-fought Presidential election, Pope Francis’ visit to Sri Lanka lost some of the media focus it would otherwise have merited. The local Catholic Church, however, worked silently throughout – with the help of the previous administration, amidst widespread speculation that the Pope might actually cancel [...]
Democracy-ta Jayawewa!
It was democracy that was the ultimate winner at Thursday’s Presidential election. Sri Lanka’s somewhat questionable recent record on elections was put back on track and for that, much of the credit must go to the Elections Commissioner, all those men and women who showed what the Public Service of this country is capable of [...]
Year of awakening
In four days’ time, 14.5 million registered voters are entitled to trek to the polling booth allotted to them and cast their vote for the Chief Executive of the Republic; half a million having already done so by postal voting. That this country still has the choice of the ballot over the bullet in choosing [...]
End this circus of crossovers
The country has been witnessing the theatrical spectacle these days of parliamentarians and lesser mortals jumping from one side to the other of the political divide. Almost all parties, big and small, have been hit by this crossover syndrome. This circus has its roots, by an unhappy co-incidence with the case of Amir Ali vs. Sri [...]
Massacre of the innocents in Peshawar
The brutes who gunned down more than 130 children in cold-blood, together with their principal and teachers in a school in Peshawar, Pakistan shocked the world with their senseless action and brought back haunting memories of the equally inhuman massacre of young Buddhist novice monks in Aranthalawa not so long ago. The Pakistan Taliban proudly [...]
The hills are alive with the sound of landslides
The drought came first, heaping untold misery upon man and beast. The deluge followed and, with it, a sweeping landslide. A succession of environmental disasters in recent years has proved that Sri Lanka remains ill-equipped to mitigate threats and save precious lives. If anything, the country is racing towards bigger catastrophes. The Koslanda landslide on [...]
Enter the Dragon
No other country in Sri Lanka’s post-war history has wielded the influence, had the reach or commanded the servility that China today does. The bilateral relationship between the two nations has grown so rapidly that few have had the time, or the required information, to analyse the direction it is taking. Sri Lanka and China [...]