Though dubbed as the "war hero", the role of Rajapaksa in ending the conflict with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam with the death of its supremo Velupillai Prabhakaran in 2009 is quite divisive as he stands accused of violating human rights, a charge he vehemently denies.
A video is being shared on social media showing the protesters counting the currency notes that were unearthed. The recovered money was said to be handed over to the security units, the Daily Mirror newspaper reported.
Thousands of irate anti-government protesters in Sri Lanka on Saturday stormed into embattled President Rajapaksa's official residence in central Colombo's high-security Fort area after breaking the barricades, as they demanded his resignation over the island nation's worst economic crisis in recent memory.
'And no one expected the case to be detected, because there was nothing.'
"The killer of Kanhaiya Lal, Riyaz Attari is a member of the BJP," Khera said in a tweet after the press conference.
The 225-member Parliament will elect the new president by a secret vote on July 20, Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena said on Friday.
Sri Lanka's embattled President Gotabaya Rajapaksa would resign on Wednesday, Parliament Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena announced late on Saturday night, hours after thousands of protesters stormed the former's official residence, blaming his government for an unprecedented economic crisis that has brought the country to its knees.
In a statement released on the eve of General Naravane's visit, the Indian high commission in Colombo described Sri Lanka as India's 'Priority One' partner.
'For the Tamil Nadu protestors to openly ask popular film actor Vijay Sethupathi not to don Murali in 800 is a travesty in every sense. It may have given them a cause to tell the world, and the governments in New Delhi, Colombo and Chennai, that the Sri Lankan ethnic issue was still alive in the state -- more so, during the current run-up to two major events in the first half of 2021,' says N Sathiya Moorthy.
The order was also imposed on parliamentarians Johnston Fernando, Pavithra Wanniarachchi, Sanjeewa Edirimanne, Kanchana Jayaratne, Rohitha Abeygunawardena, C B Ratnayake, Sampath Athukorala, Renuka Perera, Sanath Nishantha, Senior DIG Deshabandu Thennakoon among others.
Rajapaksa is the first president to be sworn in outside Colombo.
The anti-government protesters in Sri Lanka on Sunday continued to occupy the residences of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and Prime Minister Wickremesinghe, a day after they stormed into the premises and set on fire one of the buildings protesting over the nation's severe economic crisis even as the island nation is still in the dark about the embattled President's whereabouts.
India, which abstained during the vote on a strong resolution against Sri Lanka's human rights practices at the UNHRC, on Tuesday urged Colombo to fulfill its commitments on the devolution of political authority, to carry forward the process of reconciliation and address the aspirations of the Tamil community in the island nation.
Sections of top Tamil Tiger leadership on Wednesday began to surrender before rapidly advancing Sri Lankan forces, signalling an imminent collapse of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam after a two-decade long relentless battle.
Wickremesinghe is the first Sri Lankan president to be elected by Parliament following a vote.
In his concluding remarks at the 'Chintan Shivir' in Udaipur, Gandhi had said that it is only the Congress that can fight the BJP at the national level and regional outfits cannot fight this battle of ideology.
So who will be the chief guest at this year's parade on Rajpath (no, it ain't Central Vista yet!)? Dominic Xavier ponders over the question
Gota has to decide if he could order elder brother Mahinda's arrest as the agent provocateur of Monday's violence. Then he has to prepare for an interim government, in which no one would now want to become a cabinet minister leave alone prime minister, explains N Sathiya Moorthy.
From Sri Lanka's most popular political family to its most despised -- going by the voices on the streets calling for the Rajapaksas' ouster -- what went wrong for the clan? Veteran Sri Lanka watcher N Sathiya Moorthy offers an insight.
A staunch supporter of slain LTTE supremo V Prabhakaran, he also criticised the former prime minister for sending the Indian Peacekeeping Force to Sri Lanka in the 1980s.
A Mercedes-Maybach S650 Guard was recently added to the prime minister's cavalcade by the Special Protection Group.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi has said that the assassination of his father and former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi was the "single biggest learning experience" of his life, asserting that he cannot get away from the fact that the event also made him learn things that he would have never learnt otherwise.
Sri Lanka's main Opposition parties on Sunday agreed to form an all-party interim government after the anticipated resignation of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa on Wednesday, following unprecedented political turmoil that forced him and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe to offer their resignations over the mishandling of the nation's crippling economic crisis.
Former United Nations spokesperson Gordon Weiss has said that the Indian government was fully aware of the battle zone in Sri Lanka, during the conflict, including civilian casualties. He added that the Indians wanted to see the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Elam destroyed.
During the 13-minute special session, Dhammika Dassanayake, ecretary general of Parliament, announced the vacancy for the post of president.
The aftermath of Mani Ratnam's Ponniyin Selvan has led to an argument that there was no religion as Hinduism in Chola times.
Instead, there was only Saivism, Vaishnavism, etc, and that the Cholas were Saivites, and hence not Hindus, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
The rebel stronghold of Kilinochchi was decorated with red and yellow rebel flags and senior rebels joined parents of the suicide bombers -- known as the Black Tigers -- for a public ceremony.
National Television of Thamil Eelam will be beaming programmes to European nations from an undisclosed location in Sri Lanka's northeast.
An Indo-Canadian was arrested and asked to leave the country after he allegedly gave an inflammatory speech in support of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam at an event, where the flag of the outlawed Tamil rebel group was also hoisted.
'With Punjab and Kashmir in flames, it would not have been politically wise to alienate the West.' 'It would have inclined Western countries towards Pakistan.' 'It would have been a self-goal.'
'It's like looking at your own child. Quite large numbers of the dead are under 16. They grab them from their parents and they try to pull them back they get shot. These children have the dog tags and cyanide capsules. The younger children (captured) go for rehabilitation programme,' Brig Priyantha, who commands an artillery division in the north, told British newspaper The Daily Telegraph.
If the Sinhala chauvinistic ruling elite continue to deny the rights of our people and if the conditions of oppression continue, we have no alternative other than to secede, warned LTTE supremo Prahbakaran.
The United Nations Security Council on Thursday asked the Tamil Tigers to immediately surrender, renounce terrorism and join the political process through dialogue to put an end to the decades old ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka. "We demand that the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam immediately lay down arms, renounce terrorism, allow a UN assisted evacuation of the remaining civilians in the conflict area, and join the political process through dialogue," UNSC stated.
In a daring attack, two LTTE aircrafts tonight carried out strikes in the heart of Colombo dropping bombs near the Army Headquarters ground and on a government building in the high security zone. At least 28 people have been injured, news reports indicate.
'A fragile Sri Lanka will have a serious impact on the security of India.'
We present to you a special series that we had done 10 years after the IPKF withdrew from the island nation
Arunachalam Chrishanthakumar alias A C Shanthan, the de-facto leader of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam in Britain, was arrested on Tuesday for a second time in less than a year in connection with fund-raising and procurement activities for the militant outfit.Shanthan was allegedly operating with LTTE leader Anton Balasingham and trying to build up the outfit in London. He had accompanied Balasingham for peace talks in Geneva in 2006.
In the endlessly entertaining and absorbing soap opera that is India-Sri Lanka relations, wait for the next episode, Aditi Phadnis reports.
'I don't have anger or hatred towards anybody.Of course, I lost my father and for me it was a very difficult time'
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