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New gun shoots suspects to fame
They made history -- and they would have made Sri Lanka proud if they had done it legally. This was how police officers commented on the discovery of what is believed to be the world's first-ever electrically-fired revolver made by two Sri Lankans, who are now in remand.

Acting on a tipoff, police officers from Kadawatha arrested the two suspects. First, it appears as just another case of arresting suspects on charges of illegally possessing or manufacturing firearms. But soon the officers realised that the revolvers they seized were different and the suspects were geniuses.

The normal mechanism in a conventional firearm is that when the trigger is pulled, the striking metal pin makes an impact on a cap located in the rear of a bullet and this impact causes the explosives in the bullet to explode, generating a great force that would release the bullet through the barrel of the weapon.

But the seized revolver, according to DIG Padmasiri Liyanage, adopts a totally different mechanism for emitting bullets. The revolver uses two batteries to provide electricity to an electrical circuit. When the trigger is pulled, electricity is passed into the bullet through a special aluminum point at the rear of the bullet that has been modified with a filament within. The filament gets heated when electricity passes through it and causes the explosive material in the bullet to explode.

"Unfortunately, the invention was done illegally," said the DIG adding that the revolver has been made in such a way that it could contain seven bullets instead of five
He said the range of this revolver was about 50 metres and the calibre of the barrel about 5.5 mm. The revolver is yet to be patented and it was not clear whether the suspects had any intention of registering their product.

Lankans in Italy gobble job quota
A 1000 job quota offered to the Sri Lankan government by the Italian government interms of a bilateral agreement last year had mainly been used up by Sri Lankans in Italy to bring down their kith and kin or friends while the persons trained by the Labour Ministry continue to await job opportunities in Italy.

Labour Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe and Italian Ambassador Salvatore Zotta at a news conference this week said none of the Sri Lankans selected for the Italian jobs got these jobs.

"What matters as long as the Sri Lankans have made use of the opportunity," Mr. Samarasinghe said, drawing reference to last week's The Sunday Times story about the plight of 1,200 persons trained to be sent to Italy.

The Minister said the Italian Government offered the 1000 job quotas for 2002 only on November 15 and the government had thereafter asked for an extension until March 31.

"We were not geared to meet that situation and therefore could not send anybody. But now we are geared to meet the situation and hope to send those trained persons," he said. The Italian ambassador said, for this year only 500 jobs have been offered due to economic problems in Italy.

The ambassador said some 200 Sri Lankans had obtained visas and some other applications were being processed. The Labour Ministry-trained job candidates, some of whom had left their permanent jobs, have been making regular inquiries about their travel, but so far have not been given a clear response.

Some of those who have been trained and awaiting employment said the Italian Embassy in previous years also had issued visas for employment and this time the embassy had made use of the quota to issue them visas. Meanwhile, Mr. Samarasinghe said that no former Pradeshiya Sabha member had been sent as a labour attaché to Italy, as reported in The Sunday Times.

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