Jan 24 (BBC) Tamil Tigers in Batticaloa said they do not object Muslim people resettling in their original plots of land and start cultivating them. For the first time in 18 months, representatives of the LTTE and Muslim community met in Kokkadicholai to discuss land, resettlement and other post-tsunami issues. more..

Jan 24 (Xinhua) Sri Lanka's Center for National Operations (CNO) said Monday that due to timely action by heath authorities, the outbreak of infectious diseases in Sri Lanka is under tight control following the tsunami disaster. more..

Jan 24 (AIN) A Cuban medical team is on the ground in Sri Lanka assisting victims of the tsunami that slammed several Asian and African countries last month. The medical detail is made up of 16 physicians, two nurses, two hygiene specialists, three experts from Cuba's biological and pharmaceutical laboratories and an engineer. more..

Jan 24 (Xinhuanet) Sri Lanka's main opposition has urged the need to hold elections on time while responding to a remark by the country's president that all elections would be suspended during the next five years. more..

Jan 25 (NW) Kinniya Hospital on the east coast of Sri Lanka was destroyed by the Dec. 26 tsunami, and its 40 patients and hospital staff are missing. It was just one of many buildings poorly prepared for actual disaster. more..

Jan 25 (ABC) Liz Auffenberg always wanted to learn how to surf. A trip to Sri Lanka looked like an amazing destination and promised some good waves. The decision to travel was soon made and by Christmas Adam and Liz were off to enjoy the sights, sounds and smells of Hikkaduwa, situated South of Colombo. more..

Jan 25 (GI) A Sri Lankan woman clears the debris from her damaged house in Seenigama village near Galle, some 90 km south of Colombo, more..

Jan 25 (HT) In a significant break from the past, the LTTE has said that foreign troops are welcome to do tsunami relief work in areas controlled by it. LTTE's Naval Chief, Col Soosai said that it was unfortunate that foreign troops and foreign relief workers were doing relief work only in the Sinhala-dominated South Sri Lanka, avoiding the LTTE-controlled Tamil areas. more..

Jan 25 (BBC) Police Special Task Force [STF] and the LTTE were seen working together at a relief centre at Thirukkovil. "They are working to help the people. They have shed the differences in order to help the distressed." Said Wasantha Chandrapala, a journalist who visited the camp. more..

Jan 25 (HC) Lucky is more than a surname for a Rosenberg native who was visiting Sri Lanka when the deadly tsunami exploded on Dec. 26, killing more than 225,000 people in the Indian Ocean region. The most powerful earthquake in 40 years erupted under the sea near Sumatra, more..

Jan 25 (AP) A powerful undersea aftershock from last month's tsunami-triggering earthquake and another quake in central Indonesia sparked panic two countries Monday where people feared the quakes could produce another giant killer wave. more..

Jan 25 (ANN) Responding to the needs of disaster stricken Sri Lanka and the rural communities it has been working with over the last two and a half decades, Plan Sri Lanka has announced a massive increase in its country allocation commitment, up almost ten fold. more..

Jan 25 (LT) President Chandrika Kumaratunga has basically agreed to Norwegian Foreign Minister Jan Peterson for a new kind of an “interim administration” so that Wanni tiger organization would get authority to get involved in the reconstruction process of the tsunami ravaged North and the East. more..

Jan 25 (ME) Poorly planned coastal development compounded the impact of Asia's tsunami and rebuilding efforts should use natural protection provided by reefs and forests, conservation group WWF said early this week. more..

Jan 25 (Hindu) A former Tamil militant, Jegan, was shot at and critically wounded here tonight by "unidentified gunmen." According to sources, Jegan, is said to hail from the eastern Batticaloa district and was an "Army informant." more..

Jan 25 (GI) Sri Lankan workers fix electric lines in Tangalle, 250 kms from Colombo, 23 January 2005. more..

Jan 25 (TS) It took six days for Toronto's Pirundhapan Navaratnarajah to locate his younger brother, Shakaran, in Sri Lanka through a friend, who travelled 45 kilometres along pothole-filled country roads to a small northeast coastal town demolished by the Dec. 26 tsunami. more..

Jan 25 (TN) Indian navy medical team, which served in Kuchchaveli government hospital in the north of Trincomalee district since December 28 two days after Tsunami disaster completed its mission and was entertained at a farewell function at the hospital Monday morning. more..

Jan 25 (Salon) The pace of work has been relentless. I don't know if it's because I'm inspired or because I was starved for inspiration for so long. But I've been tapping off a power cell that seems to get charged only in fantastically edgy environments. more..

Jan 25 (Bloomberg) Sri Lanka's Tamil Tiger rebels said relations with the government over post-tsunami relief and reconstruction is key to reviving peace talks to end a civil war in the South Asian island. more..

Jan 25 (IANS) When you are close to events you tend to overlook them, and so it was with Gnana Moonesinghe who could take a closer look at the endemic violence that had racked her country - Sri Lanka - only at a distance. more..

Jan 25 (PIS) Peacebroker Norway yesterday ended a four-day mission to Sri Lanka after apparently wringing concessions from government and the LTTE on the need to cooperate in distributing foreign tsunami aid. more..

Jan 25 (AT) The 40 million spent by U.S President George W. Bush on a single event – his second inauguration -- is roughly one eighth of the all the money ($ 350 million) that has been pledged by the U.S for Tsunami aid for all of the tsunami-ravaged countries in the Asian region. more..

Jan 25 (AT) India has decided to set up its own Tsunami early warning system along the fault lines stretching from Java -Sumatra to Myanmar in the Indian Ocean region and in the Arabian Sea. more..

Jan 25 (Reuters) Sri Lankan seamstress Srishanthini Vetharniyam hates living in a camp for tsunami-displaced, and is desperate to be resettled in her village deep inside Tamil rebel territory and start life over. more..

Jan 25 (TP) The Anglican church of Sri Lanka has expressed concern over alarming long-term consequences if a time frame is not set for the withdrawal of foreign military personnel from Sri Lanka. Amidst reports that some 1,650 US marines have already come here and with a government official reportedly saying they may stay on for two years, Colombo’s Bishop Duleep de Chickera in a statement said. more..

Jan 25 (GI) Sri Lankan man Peter Paul uses a stick to break debris of the destroyed house of a woman (L) in Payagala village, some 50 km south of Colombo, 24 January 2005. more..

Jan 25 (ANN) The tsunami appears to have swept away the campaign for resuming peace talks. The LTTE has, according to the government media, said provision of relief to the disaster stricken should precede resumption of talks. more..

Jan 25 (GI) They fell from the sky, the inhabitants said. And it’s not because here, 130 kilometers from the capital, they are lacking international aid, but that the Cuban doctors are different. more..

Jan 25 (ANN) Finance Minister Dr. Sarath Amunugama told ‘The Island’ that the special allowance of Rs.5,000 for tsunami affected families as well as the special relief loans to businessmen and entrepreneurs, whose businesses were damaged or destroyed by the tsunami, will be paid from Jan 25 by the public sector banks. more..

Jan 25 (AP) Oregon apparel makers Nike and Columbia Sportswear have joined with several other companies to argue that the U.S. government should expand trade with Sri Lanka and 14 other countries, to mitigate the economic effects of last month's deadly tsunami. more..

Jan 25 (BBC) One month after the Boxing Day tsunami, another push is being made to encourage Sri Lankan children back to school. Those who had been able and willing returned on 10 January, but this week more are being urged to resume their education as a step towards regaining a stable life. more..

Jan 25 (TN) Charging that the Sri Lanka Government has failed to send adequate relief supplies to people in NorthEast affected by the tsunami, Dr. Rajitha Seneratne, UNP parliamentarian told Sinhala media at the Opposition Leaders office Monday more..

Jan 25 (wsws) The Asian tsunami has claimed more than 200,000 lives in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India, Thailand and other countries and left a trail of destruction in its wake. Although the tsunami had natural causes, the scale of the catastrophe was by no means inevitable. more..

Jan 25 (SLA) An unidentified gunman, suspected to be from LTTE has fired at a civilian while he was in the general city area of WELLAWATTE, COLOMBO 6 on Monday (24) night at about 10.00 p.m. more..

Jan 25 (SLA) Information received by troops from the general un-cleared areas of ANGODAVILLU confirmed that an internal clash that erupted among LTTE PRABHAKARAN and KARUNA groups on 22 January 2005 resulted in death of five LTTE cadres and injury to seven others. more..

Jan 25 (SLA) Naval troops on duty in the general area of TALAIMANNAR on 24 January 2005 around 6.00 p.m. saw the presence of about 50 Indian fishing trawlers, engaged in poaching inside Sri Lankan waters.

Jan 25 (Reuters) Sri Lanka have selected two uncapped quick bowlers in a 24-man training pool for their rescheduled two-test tour of New Zealand in April. Channaka Welagedera and Nandika Ranjith are both left-armers. more..

Jan 25 (LBO) An Rs 12 bn road development programme, over the next 4 years, is waiting for donor and lending agency funding. “We have identified and submitted to the government, long term road development projects, for donor funding,” said P Dayananda, General Manager, Road Development Authority(RDA). more..

Jan 25 (GI) Sri Lankan school children offer prayers in front of Buddhist monks sitting before a Buddha statue during a gathering, at the reopening Sudharma school, in Galle, some 120 km south of Colombo, more..

Jan 25 (LBO) The Urban Development Authority is calling for contractors to build quick, low cost housing to fast track the government’s reconstruction plan. Last week, the state announced its housing plan for the half a million people displaced in the tsunami, would amount to US$ 20 mn in its first phase, which will take up to a year. more..

Jan 25 (DJ) Sri Lanka's government has estimated the cost of rebuilding after last month's devastating tsunami at $2 billion, with a bulk of the money needed for housing, fishing boats and water supply facilities. more..

Jan 25 (PRIU) The Government wishes to clarify the work it has done towards post tsunami humanitarian relief and rehabilitation efforts. President Kumaratunga and the government in the aftermath of the tsunami disaster decided upon an inclusive and consensus driven approach to the gigantic humanitarian relief and reconstruction task facing the nation. more..

Jan 25 (AT) Twenty days have gone by since the deadly tsunami hit this island nation on December 26th 2004. The seas around the country now look calm and innocent. Driving down to the South on Saturday (15thJanuary), I saw no frolicking sea bathers or even sun bathers by the beach. Maybe we are still suffering from a collective hydrophobia. more..

Jan 25 (KRT) Tucked in a corner of beach in this suburban town is a Sri Lankan Army camp. More than 10 years ago, soldiers planted 150 land mines around the camp. On Dec. 26, the tsunami overran man-made sand berms and raged ashore, scattering the mines around the area. more..

Jan 25 (DO) She visits exotic landscapes around the globe. It's beautiful. But she could've saved a lot of cash by shooting the whole thing in Sri Lanka. The island nation, where my parents grew up, is a microcosm of Earth. Whenever I'm there, I wake up each morning with three options: a) Go to the beach. b) Go to the mountains. c) Go to the jungle. more..

Jan 25 (AP) Hong Kong's government said Tuesday it has approved a 1 million Hong Kong dollar (US$128,000; €98,000) grant for tsunami relief in Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka's Hong Kong Honorary Consul Thomas Cheung said the cash grant is more helpful for the island nation because of difficulty delivering supplies to its already busy airports, more..

Jan 25 (AFP) One month after powerful tsunamis came crashing into Sri Lanka's shores and stunned a nation more geared for war than natural calamity, the initial shock has given way to the more familiar squabbling. more..

Jan 25 (Yahoo) A poster of missing brothers and sisters is pasted on a wall at a relief camp in Sri Lanka. more..

Jan 25 (SAMN) The JVP vowed Monday its 39 MPs would oppose any attempt by the government to sell the water resources of the country to the private sector. JVP parliamentary group leader Wimal Weerawansa in a statement denied media reports that the JVP supported the government's controversial decision at a recent Cabinet meeting. more..