US: A recklessly blind supporter of Israeli action
UNITED NATIONS – When I walked out of a polling booth after voting in one of the US Senatorial elections in New York city several years ago, I was accosted by a reporter and a cameraman for the Middle Eastern TV network Al Jazeera. The woman reporter, who was also a UN correspondent at that [...]
True national heroes and those unsung
Tuesday, May 18, was a day for celebration to most Sinhalese but not Tamils who appeared to consider it a day of reckoning, at best, having suffered most in the thirty-year-long ‘war’. The usual outcome of all prolonged military conflicts, it is said, inevitably leaves behind ’An army of cripples, an army of mourners and [...]
Eureka! Community Policing in Lanka
It is very heartening that the Government has at last accepted the much-desired concept of Community Policing (CP). This idea is now institutionalised with the appointment of a State Minister to handle the subject. The pressure on the Government this time around perhaps follows from the question raised by the media: Why is this recurring [...]
Why Soil Science Society is concerned about organic fertiliser imports
The Soil Science Society of Sri Lanka has, in a letter sent to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, expressed its concerns over moves to import organic fertilisers. The Soil Science Society of Sri Lanka (SSSSL) is one of the oldest professional societies in the country with a history of 52 years. The membership includes soil scientists representing [...]
Our responsibility to South Asia
BRISBANE – Almost one-quarter of humanity lives on the Indian subcontinent. That fact is easily forgotten elsewhere, as world leaders focus on combating outbreaks of COVID-19 and its new variants within their own countries. But when our descendants pass judgment on this moment in history, they won’t remember just the lockdowns, face masks, and vaccination [...]