UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has decided to probe war crimes charges levelled against Sri Lankan authorities by international human right organizations during the last phase of the battle between government security forces and LTTE.
During his recent discussion with U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay, Ban Ki-moon stated that he is determined to press war crimes charges against Sri Lanka. More >>

The investigations into the largest stock of heroine, 70 Kg , recovered in Sri Lanka have been scuttled as a result of political influence.
It’s as a result of a coordinating secretary to the minister, Jude Tissera, being apprehended with the stock of heroin.
The police arrested the suspect at the airport while he was trying to flee the country. Later 40 Kgs of heroin were discovered on information he revealed to the interrogators. More >>

A discernible change in gear was visible in the UNP/UNF general election campaign last week. The point of pressure would be the economy - - and Ranil Wickremesinghe was repeating what General Sarath Fonseka, the presidential candidate, promised government servants at the presidential election: that he would within a short time of coming into power, raise government servants’ salaries to 10,000 rupees.
He also said that the policy of the government was to import rice from Pakistan when the local paddy cultivators are reaping their harvests - - More >>

Election Commissioner Dayananda Dissanayake met the general secretaries of the main political parties on Friday. The main topics of discussion were police inactivity, whether election monitors should be allowed inside counting centres and the possibility of inviting foreign observers. All these topics are of great importance, especially to the opposition parties who have refused to accept the presidential election results claiming that there were large scale malpractices during the counting stage. More >>

Royal College, Colombo retained the coveted Mustangs Trophy for the second successive season when they handed out a 133-run pasting to traditional rivals S. Thomas’ College MT. Lavinia on the back of an undefeated 104 by opener Chalaka Bogoda in their one-sided 35th annual limited overs cricket encounter which ended at SCC grounds yesterday evening. More >>

Though included in the T20 World Cup probables’ list after his impressive performances in the Inter-provincial T20 championships, Jeevantha Kulatunga may not make it to the final squad.
The selectors took a u-turn from their previous decision to overlook the man of the series at the inter-provincial tournament to add him to the list.
According to Sri Lanka Cricket media release issued last week, More >>

“Thilanga Sumathipala is a wonderful person coming from a good Buddhist background. He is an educated and multi-talented person. Our parliament and country needs such people. That is why we came forward to support him,” said Upul Jayasinghe, producer of the popular teledrama Ithin Ita Passe which is telecast on ITN.
Jayasinghe made these remarks at a unique ceremony which was held in Colombo recently. The entire cast and crew of the Ithin Ita Passe production had gathered together to endorse UPFA candidate from the Colombo district, More >>

Remember King Julian XIII - the self-proclaimed leader in the movie Madagascar? Alex, Marty and Malmin - characters of this famous cartoon who landed on an unknown island initially thought King Julian was a squirrel because it had a long tail with black stripes. But King Julian was in fact a ring-tailed lemur - ----- a species of primate that is native to Madagascar. The pair of ring-tailed lemurs that arrived at the Dehiwela Zoo a few days ago are cuddlesome and their furry bodies will tempt you to hug them. They have already socialized with the Sri Lankan zoo keepers. More >>

The former top United Nations official inAfghanistan said that recent arrests of high-ranking Taliban figures by Pakistan have severed important secret communications between the Taliban and the West, possibly delaying peace negotiations and making them more difficult. Kai Eide, the former special representative for the United Nations secretary general, told the BBC in an interview broadcast Friday that, for the past year, More >>

Dutch officials have rejected a retired US general’s claim that its forces failed at Srebrenica because of poor morale over openly gay soldiers.
A defence ministry spokesman dismissed as “complete nonsense” the remarks by John Sheehan, a former Nato commander.
Gen Sheehan had been speaking at a US Senate hearing on allowing gay people to serve openly in the US military. More >>

The State Pharmaceutical Corporation (SPC) is in the process of recovering its staggering loss Rs. 50, 805,000,710.00 (nearly 50.805 billion) on account of the 17 Indian drugs suppliers, who were blacklisted last year for poor quality drugs and avoiding paying dues, sources revealed.
There were several allegations that SPC had not taken prompt action to recover the said loss from Indian suppliers. So far the SPC has been able to obtain only a sum of Rs 24, 274, 000, 486 from seven suppliers. More >>

The Anglo-Australian mining company Rio Tinto says it has signed a deal with China to develop a massive iron ore mine in West Africa. China’s state metals group Chinalco will pay $1.3bn (œ0.85bn) for 47% of the Simandou project in Guinea.
According to the company, Simandou is one of the world’s biggest undeveloped iron ore deposits. The tie-up comes days ahead of the controversial trial of four Rio employees, accused of spying on China.
The deal also covers rail and port infrastructure and could create tens of thousands of jobs in Guinea. More >>

What if someone tells you that you can travel to a single place by five different ways? By foot, by train, by car, by bus, by sea and by air? You will probably laugh. But there is a place in Sri Lanka, the only such place in the entire world!
Koggala is the place, where the famous author, Martin Wickramasinghe lived. It is situated along the Colombo-Wellawaya road (A-2) between 129.9 km and 130 km. If you go to this place, you will see, as mentioned earlier, More >>

Otto Eduard Leopold von Bismarck- Schonhausen - the statesman responsible for bringing about the unification of Germany- was one of the most skilful and practical politicians the world has ever known.
He was born on April 1, 1815, at Schonhausen, in the German state of Prussia. His father belonged to the Prussian landowning class known as the Junkers. More >>