International Relations of Sri Lanka

    B roadly speaking, with proposed 20 th amendment to the constitution, or narrowing it down by saying the repeal of item (xiii) of sub-paragraph in article 91 in the constitution, the issue of Basil Rajapaksha’s potential return to Sri Lankan Parliament as a dual citizenship holder is hotly debated. Will he be able to take stately decision without adversely affecting the sovereignty of Sri Lanka? Do we have to inertly question the moral integrity of a decision made by a dual citizenship holder in state affairs? The nature of man is such that motherly and earthly inheritance cannot be cheated upon. Moreover, when the President Gotabaya calls the shots regarding Basil Rajapaksha, we Sri Lankans have to trust his judgment. Regardless this citizenship issue, we have to elect visionary and missionary enough statespersons to navigate us through potential hostile waters of Adam’s and Malacca Straits.      T hese is no doubt that years of residing in a foreign cou...

      E nvironmentalists are at an extreme end with Gotabaya Government and Basil Rajapaksha. They seem come a little bit of short to understand that development cannot be achieved without one form being transformed to another, whether it be a road or a bridge. Finding a middle path is a too much of a compromise to them. The country needs a conceptual change about the utilisation of natural resources, development and developer. H ow could a state build houses, cities, skyscrapers, roads and highways without mining crude oil, sand, gravel and soil? How could a state be self-sufficient, competitive and industrialised with its farming without some deforestations? Cannot the state nurture mud crabs in mangroves without destroying its eco system? Cannot a part of lagoon host an attractive harbour for leisure crafts and be an eco-tourism hotspot at the same time? Will such developments ruin their eco systems completely? Gotabaya Government has to utilise all the resources the...

      P reservation of true Sri Lankan Buddhist character is as paramount as securing much-needed-foreign-investments by post-Covid-19 government.  Actors in the jungle of Sri Lankan politics seem to include mainly political parties, regional blocks, religious and ethnic sects, environmentalists and individual politics of each legislators in macro level. From national policy making to road paving in a distant village is understood within these actors’ horizontal and vertical engagements. However, identifying the main actors in Sri Lankan politics are to benefit recognizing national threats, national policy making process and securement of foreign investments in post-Covid-19. Largest minority groups, Tamils, Muslims and Christians and their affiliations to investing nations needed to go through a nuanced assessments. Legislative actions to limit whole population growth and to preserve the true Sri Lankan Buddhist characters within it is paramount in post-LTTE an...

           S ince the President Gotabaya was elected he and his administration took ever greater measures to stimulate stagnating economy, cutting down taxes and increasing VAT threshold to encourage investments. He welcomed all developed nations to invest in Sri Lanka instead of finger pointing at the biggest investors. However, prevailing world reality of this unprecedented Covid-19 pandemic projects the development of our economy in a blur horizon at its worst, and as an uphill struggle at its best. Chart 1 - Ratio of world merchandise trade growth to world GDP growth, 1990‑2020 % change and ratio Source:    WTO Secretariat for trade and consensus estimates for historical GDP. Projections for GDP based on scenarios simulated with WTO Global Trade Model.                                   T he idea of being self-sufficient is up in the agen...

     N othings is more threatening a sovereign nation than another nation implicitly or explicitly recognising a military outfit within its borders. Regarding Sri Lanka, this is exactly what the Switzerland Federal Court ruling did on 3 rd of December and the ruling of Westminster Magistrates’ Court on 6 th of December. These rulings systematically try to undermine Gotabaya Rajapaksha’s new administration. There is no guarantee that these ideological and monetary space created by so-called-friendly-nations will not be exploited with weapons in the future. The Sri Lankan administration needs a multi-dimensional strategy to curtail these actions. One undeniable part of it is the urgent need to uplift the livelihood of minority communities within its territory, especially within the North and East. T he Swiss court ruled that 12 individuals acquitted for collecting money in Switzerland for Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), a EU proscribed terrorist organisat...

T oday, 13 th May, whole country is in turmoil. More than dozen cities where Muslim communities have their properties are burning. They are under Sri Lankan forces now. The material damages done to mosques and Muslim shops are innumerable. Today island wide curfew came into being on 9 PM until 6 AM tomorrow. This is almost daily occurrence now. Sri Lankan forces try to keep Muslim communities safe. S ri Lankan coalition government is in turmoil too. Today’s ground realities are in fact their making. Avoidance of Islamic extremism because of dozens of Muslim politicians in coalition with UNP party and Ranil Wickremesinghe. Their President Maithripala Sirisena from UPFA is only in name. At least Ranil wanted him that way. Constitutional amendments made by this coalition government have already fired back on them too. Constraining Presidential power, Ranil has made Sirisena weak. Since Ranil tolerate Muslim and Tamil politicians, he has the parliament majority, which made Sirisena ...

A ct of terrorism committed in Sri Lankan soil yesterday on Easter Sunday is an act against Christianity, western values and to civilized humanity. After looking at the patterns of global attacks, this wave of attacks indicates an urgent need of a true global strategy and local mechanisms to be put in place to counter Islamic Fundamentalism. With these kind of out-of-blue heinous terrorist acts blurring the distinction of peace and war time, civilized global community shall come to understand that population control of minority groups and constant intelligent gathering and sharing with internal and extern actors are needed. A bout two hours after the first few bombs went off an intelligent dossier leaked was on our whatsapp message. Looking at the letter it is crystal clear dossier is genuine. The unfolding was a coordinated terrorist attacks led by Islamist group called ‘Nations Thawahid Jaman’. The leader seems to be Mohomad Saharan. H owever, some ignorant media outlets ...