May 14 (ST) SriLankan Airlines has stopped its unprofitable air taxi operation, just 28 months after it was re-launched amidst much fanfare. “We will not operate our own aircraft,” confirmed SriLankan’s Chief Marketing Officer G.T. Jeyaseelan. The company’s costly lease agreement with the Canadian Kenn Borek Air for float planes, lapsed last month, and was not renewed. The airline is in negotiations to operate a code-share more..

May 14 (E24|7) A jet-lagged Sri Lankan unintentionally killed a grandmother and injured two members of her family in Singapore after he dozed off while driving, causing his car to mount the pavement on which the family was walking. A Singapore judge jailed Singarayar Cleetruse Geethan, 32, for a month for the accident that happened in Woodland Drive 14, ‘The Island’ reported on Monday. Lawyer Louis Joseph pleaded for a light sentence for his client Geethan, more..

May 14 (CG) President Mahinda Rajapaksa telephoned Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz Chief Nawaz Sharif and congratulated him on his victory in historic elections, the media reported. The President’s office in Colombo also confirmed that the President contacted Sharif and congratulated him on his election victory. Sharif began talks on Sunday to form a new govt, as partial election returns suggested that he and his party would have a commanding hold on Parliament, more..

May 14 (Xinhua) Increasing access to the former war- torn north, the Sri Lankan govt on Tuesday opened the first phase of a 650-million-U.S. dollar railway after 30 years of suspension and pledged to continue infrastructure development in the region, an official said. Minister Basil Rajapaksa, together with Minister Kumara Welgama, inaugurated the long- awaited train services on the Medawachchiya-Madhu segment of the more..

May 14 (AD) The UNP says the price of milk powder is set to be increased by Rs 100 and that they have been informed that discussions on the matter are currently underway. UNP General Secretary Tissa Attanayake stated that while all this is taking place the govt is slowly spreading “a story misleading the public” claiming that milk powder contains arsenic. He further stated that the JHU and Minister Wimal Weerawansa have said they will take legal action against polls being held in the North, more..

May 14 (LT) The working masses in the estate sector are severely inconvenienced due to the increase in electricity tariffs carried out by the govt and the effect of the increase is felt by the estate community in several directions says the President of All Ceylon Estate Employees Union Ramalingam Chandrasekar. He said estate workers live in line housing with their families under very pathetic conditions and with the increase in electricity tariffs they would have to confront increased more..

May 14 (NP) Pakistan Navy Ship SAIF is on a goodwill visit to the Trincomalee port from 14-17 May 2013, this visit signifies the strong diplomatic, cultural and military ties between Sri Lanka and Pakistan. The 123 meters long PNS SAIF (F-253) is a multi mission frigate capable of operating independently, or as part of Task Force in a multi-threat environment. The ship was commissioned in Sept, 2010 in China. more..

May 14 (LT) Sapugaskanda refinery would be closed down from tonight as sufficient stocks of crude oil is not available for its funcion state sources in the refinery. Internal sources of the Sapugaskanda state the situation has cropped up as the govt failed to maintain the necessary stocks of crude oil to run the refinery. The refinery that has to be closed down for the want of crude oil would cost a large amount to make it function again point out sources in the refinery. more..

May 14 (CT) A stock of paddy worth Rs 470 million obtained by private rice mill owners from the Paddy Marketing Board (PMB) on condition of returning rice stocks by processing paddy, had been kept by the mill owners for more than two years, thus depriving the PMB of its due income, an audit inspection revealed. Though rice mill owners have to return stocks after converting paddy into rice within 14 days, the audit inquiry revealed certain stocks had not been returned even after a period of 24 more..

May 14 (MEA) Minister Basil Rajapaksa will open the Sri Lanka Tourism and Hotel Management Institute which has been built at Kundasale in Kandy. The institute, equipped with all the modern facilities, is meant to train personnel required for the programme to attract 2.5 million tourists to Sri Lanka by 2016. According to the tourism development plan for the next five years implemented under Minister Rajapaksa’s more..

May 14 (LBO) Stock closed down 0.52% Tuesday amid weak banking sector results as investors continued to take profits, brokers said. The benchmark Colombo All Share Index closed 32.44 points lower at 6,206.59 down 0.52 percent and the S&P SL 20 Index closed 18.35 points lower at 3,500.50 down 0.52%. Turnover was 636 million rupees up from 535 million rupees a day earlier with 143 stocks declining and only 72 making gains as domestic investors continued to take profits. more..

May 14 (LBO) Sri Lanka has received 218 million US dollars of foreign direct investments in the first quarter of 2013 and is targeting two billion dollars for the full year, investment promotion minister Lakshman Abeywardena said. The money has come from 37 projects greater than a million US dollars and 144 projects smaller than a million US dollars. The investors came from, Taiwan, Canada, Virgin Islands, Netherlands, Singapore, UK, Australia and India. Minister Abeywardena said more..

May 14 (LBO) An Indian Ocean cyclone named after an ancient Sri Lankan king who is famed for building irrigation tanks had brought the highest water inflows in a single day to the island's hydro power storage system. CEB said 106 million cubic meters of water which can generate 144 GigaWatt hours of electricity had flowed in to the reservoirs in the 24 hours ending Tuesday morning. Water is worth about Rs 3.2 billion more..

May 14 (CG) A commemoration ceremony is to be held in Vavuniya on Saturday to remember the hundreds of Tamil civilians killed during the final stages of the war. The event is to mainly focus on the hundreds believed to have been killed in Mullivaikal. TNA members, other Tamil politicians, civilians and family members of those killed in the battle are expected to take part in the event, reports said. A UN panel had found that as many as 40,000 civilians may have been killed in more..

May 14 (AD) UNP MP Sajith Premadasa stated that becoming the leader of the party is not a decision he can make by himself and that it has to be made by the UNP, party assembly, Working Committee and parliamentary group. Right now they have all reached a certain decisions and therefore under the existing situation my main target is to bring victory for the party and to serve the people of the country, he said. Taking part in his first ever live TV political discussion last night on Derana 360, more..

May 14 (LBO) Sri Lanka's new restrictions on foreign ownership of property will have provisions that will allow non-nationals investing in the country to lease land with a tax of 5 to 15%. Minister Lakshman Yapa Abeywardena said it was the policy of the administration to stop the sale of land outright to foreigners but foreign investors will be allowed to lease land for up to 99 years, after a paying a tax. more..

May 14 (E24|7) Funny, but true. A dog in the Sri Lankan town of Katharagama Kandasuridugama died after being hit by a speeding Jeep transporting a group of foreigners from the Yala Wildlife Sanctuary. A woman by the roadside began to cry and wail over the dead dog. The foreigners travelling in the jeep felt very sad and guilty for what had happened and made a collection of SRs25, 000 and gave it to the woman. However, the Lanka Mirror reports that no sooner had the Jeep left, more..

May 14 (DM) All Ceylon Federation of Lanka Private Bus Association (ACFLPBOA) said its members would launch a countrywide bus strike on May 19 midnight. Association Secretary Anjana Priyanjith said the transport authorities had failed to increase the bus fares as requested by private bus owners in the wake of the recent fuel hike. Meanwhile, Lanka Private Bus Owners Association (LPBOA) Chairman Gemunu Wijeratna said they were not aware of such a strike. “We will take a decision regarding more..

May 14 (DM) Minister Basil Rajapaksa said that 85% of foreign loans to the country were spent on developing the North and resettling people displaced by the war. He was addressing the crowd which attended the opening of the first stage of the 106 km Medawachchiya-Talaimannar railway line at the Madhu Road railway station. With the completion of the first stage of 43 km of railway track trains can now reach Madhu from more..

May 15 (NS) The electricity tariff issue was not settled until the middle of the last week. Various issues are raised in the society and in newspapers, all of those could be summarized as following; the issues related to the reality of the relief provided for the consumers, who use less than 60 units, the scale of the relief provided for consumers, who fall between 60-180 units, the effort of the opposition political parties and trade unions trying to highlight the insufficient more..

May 15 (NS) All our successive govts have indeed been astonishingly alike in many aspects. They have all displayed the same style of governance, the same discreditable values, the same pomposity and the same disgusting forbearance for their own mainly dishonest cronies and flunkies. That has always been a weak and suicidal proclivity of all politicos, with no exceptions. History is not supposed to repeat itself, particularly if you are willing to learn by one’s own mistakes more..

May 15 (NS) ‘Eppawala’ signifies many things. It is the location of the richest mineral resource we have. It is located on the borders of the Jaya Ganga and Ruvanveliseya and all they mean to our people and to the rest of humankind. In the 1980s, the UNP engaged in preliminary discussions with Freeport McMoRan, the most notorious mining company in the world and its fronts: Rio Tinto Corporation of Australia and Tomen Corporation of Japan. more..

May 15 (DBS) It hasn’t been a century since Shyam Selvadurai was a star presence on the Canadian literary stage, but it was in a previous century that most of us last saw him — in 1998, to be precise, when his second novel Cinnamon Gardens solidified the profile established by his 1994 debut Funny Boy, a book that won what is now called the Amazon.ca First Novel Award and quickly became a foundation text both as gay literature and South Asian Canadian fiction. more..

May 15 (DBS) The main political drama over the past several days was the detention of Azath Salley and the hunger strike he had launched while in detention. During the few days that he was in CID custody Salley was being transported from the CID headquarters to hospital and back in the full glare of media attention. He was visited in the hospital by the Chairman of the Human Rights Council as well. The present writer has known Salley from the time he was in the Sri Lanka Mahajana Party and more..

May 15 (DBS) The Indian Ocean like other seas is bountiful and its resources benefit many. But for the Sri Lankan and Indian fishermen, fishing in the deep blue waters of the Palk Strait, from time to time, it also amounts to fishing in troubled waters. While both countries handle the issue of fishermen and their livelihood” through diplomatic channels, for the fisher folk, it is far more direct and person to person. more..

May 14 (CT) Usually I write on economic issues, especially on macroeconomic issues. Very rarely I write something of common interest. That is why I dedicated my previous piece to write something about BBS. However this essay is on economics or the impending economic calamity of Sri Lanka. Forecasted GDP growth has now been reduced. At the beginning of this year the Central Bank of Sri Lanka (CB) forecasted that the country would achieve 7.5% of GDP growth. more..

May 14 (CT) If the people are to participate in governance then devolution of power to the periphery is essential. This reflects Tocqueville’ assertion of decentralization being indispensable for a system of active popular rule – power to the people and equal opportunities for all. But politicians who get elected don’t want people’s participation thereafter. They would prefer the people to mind their business until the next election. The colonial state was not a democracy. more..

May 14 (SO) It was day time, around 1.30 pm. People were hurrying to catch the buses for their destinations while some were standing under the shadow of trees until the buses came. Some college students were chatting with each other till their bus began the journey. Some elders and middle age women were sitting inside the bus stand. Long distance buses started to leave on time. Everything was taking place as usual but the development of Ampara bus stand stuck out like a sore thumb. more..

May 15 (Island) While the tropical cyclone Mahasen is ‘getting better organised’, according to NASA, to track North through the Bay of Bengal and make landfall with a devastating impact, some Sri Lankans have let out a howl of protest against its name. Mahasen, they point out, is the name of a great Sri Lankan king who built many tanks, canals and temples and, therefore, must be respected. The Meteorological Department of Sri Lanka has tendered an apology for having proposed that name; more..

May 15 (Island) What the gravitational physicists did after Maxwell was to introduce the concept of gravitational field in order to explain or understand how a particle exerts a gravitational force on any other particle wherever in the universe the two particles may be. However, it is a so called explanation as nobody understands what is meant by an explanation in this case. In this regard I would like to mention what I "learnt" from my Chemistry teacher in the fourth form (Grade 10). more..

May 15 (Island) The country’s largest private bank, Commercial Bank of Ceylon, reported a net profit of Rs. 2,241 million for the quarter ended March 31, 2013, down 20% from Rs. 2,804 million a year earlier, while group net profits fell 19.72% to Rs. 2,256.7 million. Releasing its first quarterly statement based on new Sri Lanka Accounting Standards (SLFRS) which are based on International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) for interim accounts, the bank said more..

May 15 (FT) Minister Lakshman Yapa Abeywardena assured that payments on the controversial Krrish project would be completed by the end of May. Dealing with the knotty issue, Abeywardena said that 81% of the Rs. 4,995 million project has been paid up, which is a value of Rs. 4,049 million. He admitted that the total should have been completed by the end of March 2013 but stressed that the oversight was on the part of the SL Govt, which had to sort out a discrepancy with the UDA. more..

May 15 (FT) With the insurance industry of Sri Lanka currently holding just 3% of the total assets of the financial sector, Central Bank Governor Nivard Cabraal expressed that this figure indicates the prevalence of immense potential for growth. Despite the insurance industry having 22 companies, of which 12 are composite, Cabraal said that that the 3% is not a “great number” during his keynote speech at "The future of more..

May 15 (DN) The Wild Life Department is exploring the possibility of erecting a jute fiber fence parallel and close to the electric fence currently constructed to ward off elephant encroachment into villages. Wildlife Resources Conservation Minister Wijayamuni Zoysa said that elephants will not get close to the jute fiber fence because of its thorny nature. Construction of a parallel jute fence would prevent elephants from moving into nearby villages and crop cultivations. more..

May 15 (DN) The total population of Sri Lanka is only 20 million but about 100 million patients obtain treatment from state and private hospitals annually. Sri Lanka spends over 80 per cent of its annual health budget on curative care and only 20 per cent is spent on primary health care (preventive health care). This should be changed, Health Minister Maithripala Sirisena said. He said that priority has been given to improve primary health care under the Health Ministry’s five year more..

May 15 (Island) Elections Chief Mahinda Deshapriya alleged that a politically motivated campaign to discredit his department subsequent to the last presidential election in April 2010 had boomeranged on the Opposition. He asserted that such propaganda was counter-productive and detrimental to the interests of the Opposition. He acknowledged that he was referring to the much hyped allegation that his department had manipulated the presidential election result. more..

May 15 (CT) Leader of the NFF and Minister Wimal Weerawansa, said Buddhist monks of the Bodu Bala Sena (BBS) should challenge the Norway agent in their organization and the officials of the Norwegian Embassy in Colombo. He was referring to a recent challenge by BBS to either prove allegations that they were recipients of funding from either Norway or any international non-governmental organization (INGO) or to walk on the road wearing a loin cloth! more..

May 15 (Island) Atomic Energy Authority (AEA) said that they had detected no radiation in the imported milk products and canned fish in their tests to date. AEA, Chairman, Dr. Ranjith Wijewardane said that the Authority would continue the radiation tests on imported milk food, fish and canned fish. "So far there has been no contamination recorded but we will continue our tests as we did it in the past," he said. He also said that he would not bow to any foreign pressure when more..

May 15 (Island) Fourteen police officers of the Padukka police station received lightning transfers yesterday within a few hours of a level crossing mishap where two persons including a child attending a Montessori were killed at Moragahatenna, Arukwatte while a school van was hit by a Colombo bound train. Driver of the van R.A. Hemantha (39) and child Pasindu Malsara Samarasekera (5) were killed on the spot more..