January 11, 2018 · 6:39 pm

Roundtable Investment Forum with Sovereign Wealth Funds in Colombo

Island Report, 11 January 2018

Malik Samarawickrama, Minister of Development Strategies and International Trade opened a two day Roundtable Investment Forum with Sovereign Wealth Funds (SWFs) in Colombo yesterday under the patronage of the Prime Minister.

The Roundtable was an initiative by the minister following his visit to the Global Investment Forum in Dubai during November 2017 and is jointly hosted by the Central Bank of Sri Lanka and the Board of Investment. He met several of these Funds in Dubai and they were enthused by the potential of Sri Lanka as an investment destination. The fact that so many SWFs accepted the invitation to participate in the Roundtable at short notice was a validation of our nation’s value proposition and its increasing attractiveness due to the current economic policies under adoption, a press release said. Continue reading →

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January 11, 2018 · 6:25 pm

Media Faux Pas about Celebrity Mallika

DAWN Desk Report, 11 January 2018

Just how much can the media get wrong about the life of a celeb? According to Mallika Sherawat, just about everything. Yesterday, AFP reported that Mallika and her French husband Cyrille Auxenfans are being evicted from their apartment in a posh neighbourhood of Paris after having failed to pay its rent and other expenses, which now amount to a whopping 78,787 euros.

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January 7, 2018 · 5:00 am

Neville Weereratne passes Away after a Full Life

Vale in The Island, 7 January 2018

Neville Weereratne could be considered as a polymath; a person of wide knowledge or learning which included among other things literature, music, art and writing. It is in painting though that he is most known and revered.

Neville married Sybil Keyt on 6 June 1959.

  photo 2 by Dominic Sansoni

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January 5, 2018 · 5:18 pm

LTTE Financiers under Legal Gun in Switzerland … At Last!

News Item Times Online, 5 January 2018

Thirteen financiers accused of funnelling more than $15.3 million to the separatist group the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Elam (LTTE) will stand trial before a Swiss Federal Criminal Court on Monday, foreign media reported.  According to a report in Swissinfo the accused are from Switzerland, Germany and Sri Lanka. Some are former members of the World Tamil Coordinating Committee (WTCC), which represented the LTTE in Switzerland until 2009, and include its founder, his deputy and the person in charge of finances. 

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January 4, 2018 · 5:16 pm

Indian Aid is without Strings says Ambassador Sandhu

Editor, NewsInAsia, 4 January 2018, where the title runs  India’s only aim in Lanka is to cooperate and collaborate with it, says envoy Taranjit Singh Sandhu””

The Indian High Commissioner in Sri Lanka, Taranjit Singh Sandhu, has said that India’s only agenda in Sri Lanka is to “cooperate and collaborate” with it, and that Indo-Lankan bilateral cooperation is all about “sharing and caring” and devoid of “caveats and riders”. Speaking here on Wednesday following the signing of an agreement by which Sri Lanka will purchase 209 state of the art ambulances with an Indian grant of US$ 15.02 million, the Indian envoy quoted Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi  who said in July 2016 that India joins hands with its dear and near partner, Sri Lanka, to cooperate on projects, “based on Sri Lanka’s own choices and priorities for development.”

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January 3, 2018 · 3:32 pm

Appreciating the Lake House Building

Ishara Jayawardane in conversation with Professor Manawadu, 3 Janaury 2018, where the title is

The physical presence of the Lake House building is enough to awaken a sense of awe in all those who behold it. The building commissioned by D.R. Wijewardena, is a white colossal monument that has dominated the landscape, housing some of the most revered newspapers in the world.

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January 3, 2018 · 1:58 pm

Celebrating DR Wijewardene and the DAILY NEWS

Lakdev Liyanagama, in Daily News, 3 January 2018, with the title A century’s fruition

The centenary that the Ceylon Daily News celebrates this year is also a hundred years where this newspaper, newspapers in Sri Lanka and indeed the media, in general, have metamorphosed several times over, serving different roles depending on the needs of the day.

“DR’–a classic photograph by Lionel Wendt

A hundred years ago, in 1917, the Ceylon Daily News was born when Don Richard Wijewardene (known as ‘DR’ to all), took ownership of The Ceylonese and re-christened it the Ceylon Daily News. Wijewardene was involved in the movement to gain Independence from Britain and was not shy to use his newspaper for that purpose. In that sense, the Ceylon Daily News had an enmeshed roe in the country’s politics from its very inception. Continue reading →

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January 2, 2018 · 5:54 pm

The Colombo Port City: Basic Details

Editor, News-in-Asia, 2 January 2018, where the title is  Sri Lankan PM undertakes inspection tour of China funded Port City project””

Sri Lankan Prime Minister, Ranil Wickremesinghe, on Tuesday made an inspection tour of a 1.4 billion dollar mega port city which is being constructed close to the Colombo Harbour in the island’s capital.

The Colombo Port City, which will be the first of its kind in South Asia, is being constructed by China Harbour Engineering Company (CHEC). Wickremesinghe, who was accompanied by several ministers, was briefed by the Port City management on the overall project and the present stage of construction. “This project which will also be a financial center will convert Sri Lanka into a global hub in the Indian Ocean region,” Wickremesinghe told reporters at the site of construction.

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January 1, 2018 · 1:02 pm

Terrorism within Pakistan Today

Zahid Hussain, in Dawn, 1 January 2017,  where the title  is “The Missing Element

The attack on a Quetta church on Christmas Eve, days after the carnage at a Peshawar college, is a grim reminder of terrorism far from being contained despite the government’s claim of success in counter-terrorism drive branded as Raddul Fasaad, or ‘elimination of discord’. While the security officials describe it as the next phase of the ongoing campaign, there are some serious flaws in the approach as witnessed during 2017.

  Terror outfit ISIS have claimed the Quetta bomb blast which killed 15 and wounded 40 (Reuters)

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January 1, 2018 · 12:45 pm

Malala outpaces Jinnah, Benezir and Imran in Wikipedia Reference stakes in 2017

DAWN Item entitled “Malala was the most popular Pakistani on Wikipedia in 2017: report

A report by The Wikimedia Foundation’s Pakistan affiliate revealed Malala’s Wikipedia page had over 2.5 million views

Malala Yousufzai topped the list of most searched Pakistanis on Wikipedia for a second year in a row, revealed a report of the Pakistan affiliate of The Wikimedia Foundation. The list, which tabulates Wikipedia searches of Pakistani personalities, is based on searches carried out from January 1, 2017 to December 20, 2017.  Here’s who all made it to the top 20:

1) Malala Yousufzai (2,558,980 pageviews)

How Malala made headlines in 2017:

Malala makes it to Bazaar’s 150 Visionary Women list

Relax, Malala’s jeans aren’t an assault on your national identity

Urdu edition of Malala’s book ‘will remove misconceptions’

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