Showing 1 - 10 of 109
Leader seeks power boost from parliament poll
News, Published on 16/11/2024
» Sri Lanka began counting votes in a parliamentary election that will decide whether the nation's outsider leftist president will be able to fulfill his ambitious pledges to combat corruption and rewrite an unpopular International Monetary Fund loan programme.
Leftists sweep Sri Lankan parliamentary poll
Published on 15/11/2024
» COLOMBO - The sweeping election win by the coalition of Sri Lankan President Anura Kumara Dissanayake has underlined widening support for his leftist policies, but he faces the test of steering the recovery from a financial crisis with an inexperienced set of lawmakers.
New IMF debt deal needs a rejig
Oped, Published on 03/10/2024
» Ranil Wickremesinghe, Sri Lanka's president, recently lost his re-election bid after voters overwhelmingly rejected the debt-restructuring deals he negotiated with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and other creditors. Instead, Sri Lankans elected Anura Kumara Dissanayake, leader of the left-wing National People's Power (NPP) alliance and a vocal critic of IMF-imposed austerity measures, who has vowed to renegotiate the country's agreement with the fund.
Marxist leads presidential vote as Sri Lanka rejects the old order
Published on 22/09/2024
» COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — Marxist candidate Anura Kumara Dissanayake led the early counting in Sri Lanka’s presidential elections Sunday, riding a wave of popular anger at the established political order that has run the South Asian nation’s economy into the ground.
Candidates vying to lead economy out of crisis
News, Published on 21/09/2024
» Sri Lanka's upcoming presidential election has become a referendum on a US$3 billion (99.1 billion baht) International Monetary Fund loan programme that has helped to pull the island nation out of its worst economic crisis since independence. The contest pits the incumbent president, who negotiated the bailout, against the country's main opposition leader -- both members of the Sri Lankan political elite -- and a Marxist politician waging a populist campaign. The three have put contrasting views before voters over how to steer the South Asian nation past the crisis.
The deepening political turmoil in South Asia
Oped, Brahma Chellaney, Published on 15/08/2024
» Violent student-led, Islamist-backed protests in Bangladesh have toppled Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's government, and mob attacks targeting those viewed as supporters of her secular Awami League party -- in particular, the country's dwindling Hindu minority -- are proliferating. At a time when neighbouring Myanmar is engulfed in violence and the Pakistan-Afghanistan belt remains fertile ground for cross-border terrorism, political upheaval in Bangladesh, two years after the overthrow of Sri Lanka's government, is the last thing India, the regional power, needs.
Rajapaksa scion running for president of Sri Lanka
Published on 07/08/2024
» COLOMBIA - A scion of the powerful Rajapaksa clan is running for the presidency of Sri Lanka in elections next month, more than two years after his populist uncle had to flee the country and resign amid an economic crisis.
Sri Lanka's dangerous debt crisis
Oped, Published on 20/09/2023
» More than a year after the mass protest movement known as the Aragalaya ousted Sri Lanka's President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and his brother, Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa, Sri Lankans have once again taken to the streets.
Sri Lanka unveils debt restructuring plan
AFP, Published on 29/06/2023
» COLOMBO: Sri Lanka's central bank on Thursday unveiled a far-reaching domestic debt restructuring plan aimed at restoring stability after an economic and political crisis last year that led to the toppling of then-president Gotabaya Rajapaksa.
IMF links Sri Lanka bailout to tackling corruption
AFP, Published on 21/03/2023
» COLOMBO: Sri Lanka must not allow entrenched corruption to undermine a bailout for its bankrupt economy, the IMF said Tuesday after signing off on a $3 billion loan for the crisis-hit nation.