Sri Lanka News Updates with Discussions

The MP asked whether the Premier would state as to why the government allows KP to perform political activities even to the extent of forming a political party and whether he has travelled on state expense by helicopter.

Bayagotha and regime chief ,as a preliminary sacrifice (among the many more to follow), are to betray the STF of the Forces by claiming that they are connected with the multiple murder of 17 relief workers at Mulaitivu. This STF group was the first to enter the Mulaitivu Town when it was held siege by the LTTE . It was an officer who was a Colonel at that time who had given orders to them.

Over 8,787 government schools do not have principals, Parliament was told yesterday.

Police look for Minister s aide
Kahawatte double murder

The Police yesterday cast a huge net for the arrest of Godakawela Pradeshiya Sabha Member H. L. Dharmasiri, who is one of the principle suspects in the Kahawatte double murder of a mother and daughter in the Kotakathena area at Kahawatte on or about January 31.

The neighbours of murdered mother and daughter had been enraged by the killings and had torched Pradeshiya Sabha member Dharmasiri s house and four other houses. He and their relations had fled the Kahawatte area and are in hiding.

Police sources said that there was political influence and pressures exerted on the Police to stop the investigations which was also the reason for the delay in the arrests.

Investigations conducted by the CID have revealed that the reason for the killings had been a dispute that arose over Raju using innocent Kavindya to courier heroin.

The deceased daughter 19-year-old Kavindya Chathurangani was a student of Ferguson s Girl School, Ratnapura. The killer had been living in the neighbourhood. It has also been revealed that Kavindya s family and the family of the killer had been maintaining a close association and friendship as neighbours. It all began when the suspect killer and his wife had asked Kavindya to carry a parcel of food to one of their relations at the Ratnapura bus stand, while on her way to school.

One day, Kavindya had come home with the parcel without going to school as she had fallen ill and her mother, on suspicion, had opened the so called packet of food and found packets of heroin inside. Provoked, she had gone to the neighbours and scolded them for putting her innocent daughter into in danger by dragging her into their criminal activity. This followed the two families distancing themselves from each other. Raju s brother, who is the Pradeshiya Sabha member, also has a son who served as a Prison Guard and recently had been jailed for possessing heroin in his almyrah within the prison premises. It is also revealed that the consignments of heroin that Kavindya was asked to transport under the guise of a parcel of food was also meant for this son of the Pradeshiya Sabha Member who is now serving a prison sentence. The PS member s son had been caught with heroin inside his quarters only about a week after Kavindya s family found out about the food parcel ruse.

A severe rupee liquidity shortfall in the market forced banks to sell their dollar holdings which strengthened the rupee against the dollar with exporters seen converting their positions as well, dealers said.

The rupee strengthened against the greenback closing at Rs. 121.10/30 after opening the day at Rs. 121.45/55, but not before weakening to Rs. 121.70 during the day on import demand.

'Importer demand drove down the rupee at the beginning of the day but then a severe rupee liquidity shortfall in the market forced some banks to convert their dollar holdings which saw the rupee strengthen against the dollar. Exporters too were seen converting their dollar holdings which consolidated the rupee s position for the day,' a currency dealer told The Island Financial Review.

Some banks are struggling to maintain there overnight rupee positions and borrowed Rs. 10.15 billion from the Central Bank, who lent the money as the lender of last resort via the 9 percent reverse repo window. For the past five days a total of Rs. 33.89 billion has been borrowed by the banking sector this way.

The Central Bank has also printed around Rs. 24 billion over the last four days, pumping rupees via reverse repo auctions to inject liquidity into the system. Yesterday it injected Rs. 10 billion.

Overnight interbank borrowing rates increased further to 9.83 percent for lending backed by security from 9.78 percent the previous day and 8.86 percent for lending backed by securities from 8.78 percent the previous day.

Immediately revamp the Sapugaskanda oil refinery which is more than 40 years old, rather than pursuing the wisp-o-will of building a large grassroots refinery with a foreign partner, said Al Troner, President of Asia Pacific Energy Consulting, Houston, USA, who was one of the guest speakers and participants at the Asia Energy Security Summit 2012, held last week in Colombo.
When I asked the invitees at the summit when are you going to revamp the oil refinery there was no answer from your own Minister of Petroleum Resources, Susil Premajayantha who was seated there.
In the past decade there were some serious proposals that were presented to the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC) to revamp the oil refinery but nothing has taken place. Five years ago there were some bids but they had not even short listed any from the five companies that had submitted proposals. So, is it going to be implemented before the end of the decade? If it goes on like this you will have to import more and more oil products.
The 42 year-old refinery which has a daily output of 50,000 barrels that produces a mix of diesel, kerosene, gasoline, furnace oil and naphtha is currently operating at very low capacity of as one of its major sections is closed for repair.
The Ministry of Petroleum and Petroleum Resource Development website states thus: Sapugaskanda: Progress up to 30.06.2010 Feasibility Study. The contract of detailed feasibility study was awarded to M/s KBC Advanced Technology (Pvt) Ltd., Singapore at a cost of EURO 1,265,000 in March 2010.