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The Asian Development Bank has announced a grant and loan package worth US$ 50m to support Sri Lanka’s health care system.

Sri Lanka has seen a decline in polio, malaria and filariasis in the past two decades but there has been a rise in non-communicable diseases such as cancer and heart disease, driven by lifestyle changes.

This is putting more pressure on the country’s health system.

The package will help Sir Lanka provide more responsive health services to provinces that are under-served and also strengthen skills within the sector.

Brian Chin, ADB social sector specialist, said: “Sri Lanka has made impressive gains in ensuring access to and quality of health services for all.

“But challenges remain, including a dramatic increase in non-communicable diseases, which are causing a surge in demand for health services and rises in costs.”

The project will upgrade 135 medical care units and divisional hospitals in four provinces, providing new equipment, emergency treatment, dental and other clinical services.

It will also refurbish 127 field health centres and provide equipment and staff training.

The total cost of the project is US$ 60m of which the ADB is providing a grant of US$ 12.5m and a concessional loan of US$ 37.5m.

The government is putting US$10m towards the total cost of the project, which is due for completion at the end of November 2023.

Sri Lankan police on Tuesday won permission from a court to ask Chinese phone manufacturer Huawei to help recover data from a phone used by a police informant who has alleged a plot to kill President Maithripala Sirisena. 

Informant Namal Kumara said at a news conference last month he had discussed the plot by phone with a senior police officer. He has since been questioned but not charged with any offence. 

Former Sri Lankan Secretary to the Ministry of Defence, Gotabaya Rajapaksa was also a target of the plot, Kumara said. 

Officials at the Criminal Investigation Department of police on Tuesday told the court that some of Kumara's phone data, which could be evidence, had been deleted and they needed Huawei's technical help to retrieve it. 

Sri Lankan law prevents police from asking Huawei to help without first obtaining explicit permission from a court. The court granted it on Tuesday. 

A man named as M Thomas from India's southern state of Kerala was arrested in Sri Lanka on Sept. 22 on suspicion of involvement in the plot. 

Thomas appeared in court on Tuesday and requested that he not remain in CID custody, saying there had been death threats against him by the CID. The magistrate denied Thomas' request. 

The alleged plot briefly threatened to cause tension between Sri Lanka and its much larger neighbour India, after an Indian newspaper report that Sirisena had accused India's intelligence services of involvement - a claim New Delhi and Colombo have both denied. 

(Times of India)

Facebook has said its moderators have removed 8.7 million child abuse images in the past three months, as the company battles pressure from regulators and lawmakers worldwide to speed up removal of illicit material.

It said on Wednesday that previously undisclosed software automatically flags images that contain both nudity and a child, helping its reviewers. A similar machine learning tool was also revealed that it said caught users engaged in “grooming” of minors for sexual exploitation.

Facebook has vowed to speed up removal of extremist and illicit material, and machine learning programs that sift through the billions of pieces of content users post each day are essential to its plan.

Facebook’s global head of safety Antigone Davis told Reuters in an interview the “machine helps us prioritise” and “more efficiently queue” problematic content for its reviewers.

The company is exploring applying the same technology to its Instagram app.

Machine learning is imperfect, and news agencies and advertisers are among those that have complained this year about Facebook’s automated systems wrongly blocking their posts.

Davis said the child safety systems would make mistakes but users could appeal. “We’d rather err on the side of caution with children,” she said.

Before the new software, Facebook relied on users or its adult nudity filters to catch such images. A separate system blocks child abuse that has previously been reported to authorities.

Facebook has not previously disclosed data on child nudity removals, though some would have been counted among the 21m posts and comments it removed in the first quarter for sexual activity and adult nudity.

Shares of Facebook fell 5% on Wednesday.

Facebook said the program, which learned from its collection of nude adult photos and clothed children photos, had led to more removals.

In some cases, the system has caused outrage, such as when it censored the Pulitzer Prize-winning photo of a naked girl fleeing a Vietnam war napalm attack.

The child grooming system evaluates factors such as how many people have blocked a particular user and whether that user quickly attempts to contact many children, Davis said.

Michelle DeLaune, chief operating officer at the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC), said it expected to receive about 16m child abuse tipoffs worldwide this year from Facebook and other tech companies, up from 10m last year. With the increase, NCMEC said it was working with Facebook to develop software to decide which tips to assess first.

DeLaune acknowledged that a crucial blind spot was encrypted chat apps and secretive “dark web” sites where most new child abuse images originate.

Encryption of messages on Facebook-owned WhatsApp, for example, prevents machine learning from analysing them. DeLaune said NCMEC would educate tech companies and “hope they use creativity” to address the issue.

A special hotline was launched by the Ministry of Finance and Media today to assist entrepreneurs with Enterprise Sri Lanka credit schemes.

Any entrepreneur can dial the special hotline, 1925, to submit their inquiries, complaints and feedback.

Finance Minister Mangala Samaraweera said that the government hopes to create 100,000 entrepreneurs in the country within the first year of the program consisting of collateral free concessionary loan schemes for entrepreneurs.

Samaraweera further said that he expects to widen the scope of the programme in the upcoming budget.

Hundreds of estate workers protested in Colombo yesterday to demand a wage revision. 

The protesters, carrying placards and shouting slogans, had gathered at Galle face grounds and later blocked a few roads in the city to press for their demands. The workers coming from Nuwara Eliya, Badulla and several other estates are demanding that their basic daily wage be increased from existing LKR 530 to LKR 1,000. 

The estate owners union had agreed to increase the daily pay to LKR 900 which was rejected by the workers union.

Earlier, the protests were held in several parts of Central and Uva provinces where most of the tea estates are located. 

Minister of Plantation Industries Navin Dissanayake has said that the cost of production, productivity and profitability does not justify the demand.

However, ministers representing the workers have supported the demand and called for government intervention to solve the problem. 

Most of the tea estate workers are Tamils of Indian origin, who were settled by the British in the early twentieth century.

A delegation from the U.S. Department of State’s Office of Weapons Removal and Abatement visited Sri Lanka from October 8 to 12, 2018 to observe U.S.-funded demining activities and meet with some of the beneficiaries of these projects.  The projects are part of the nearly 600 million Sri Lankan rupees ($3.5 million) in assistance that the U.S. Department of State has provided towards Sri Lanka’s demining efforts in fiscal year 2018. 

The group met with the Ministry of Re-settlement, the National Mine Action Center, and the Sri Lanka Army’s Engineering Brigade and traveled to Jaffna, Kilinochchi, Vavuniya, and Mannar to review mine clearance operations.  During meetings with families who had returned to their homes on land recently released back to them, the delegation heard about the impact mine clearance has made on the daily lives of local residents.  Thus far in 2018, U.S. funding has cleared 1.86 million square meters and safely removed 9,344 land mines and unexploded ordnance and 8,637 items of small arms ammunition.  

A female supervisor participates in a demining demonstration in Mannar

“We are proud to support Sri Lanka’s national mine action strategy and the goal of making Sri Lanka  mine-impact free by 2020,” said Chargé d'affaires Robert Hilton.  “Landmine removal directly supports peace and reconciliation in Sri Lanka by allowing citizens to return safely to their homes, businesses, schools, and places of worship.” 

Since 2002, the United States has provided more than 9.5 billion Sri Lankan rupees ($56 million) to clear explosive hazards in Sri Lanka.   Thanks to U.S. funding and in cooperation with the Sri Lanka Army, the Batticaloa District was declared mine-impact free in 2017.  U.S. funding continues to assist in clearance efforts in the other eight districts affected by landmine contamination and currently supports 664 de-mining jobs across the Northern and Eastern Provinces. 

The U.S. Government has assisted in clearance operations through its local partner the Delvon Association for Social Harmony and through international partners such as HALO Trust and the Mines Advisory Group.  U.S. funding has supported training and provided equipment to the Sri Lanka Army, including specially trained dogs for mine detection.  The United States has also funded mine risk education through the international partner Spirit of Soccer.

Sri Lankan police arrested and charged a senior naval officer on Wednesday (24) for the abduction and murder of two Tamil businessmen during the final stages of the island's brutal civil war.

Lieutenant Commander K. A. Dayananda was taken before a magistrate and remanded in custody over the double murder, which investigators believe took place in January 2009.

Police said the victims, both from the Tamil minority group, were kidnapped by naval officers and later killed despite their families paying a ransom for their release. (Photo: AFP/Ishara S. KODIKARA)

"The vehicle of the two victims was taken to Welisara navy camp on the pretext that it contained a bomb," a police official told AFP.
"Later, they dismantled the vehicle and sold the parts after having killed the two men."

Sri Lanka is investigating the disappearance and presumed murder of 11 young men between 2008 and 2009 in the dying days of the 37-year civil war between government forces and Tamil separatists.

Several navy officers are currently on bail in connection with the alleged disappearances. The missing men are believed to have been murdered before the brutal conflict ended in 2009.

Senior military figures and close associates of former strongman president Mahinda Rajapakse have been accused of murders, cover-ups and extortion during his decade of rule.

Several intelligence officers have also been released on bail for charges related to the assassination of a prominent newspaper editor and attacks on other journalists and dissidents.

The January 2009 killing of journalist Lasantha Wickrematunga, a fierce critic of then-president Rajapaksa, sparked international outcry and shone a light on human rights violations in Sri Lanka.

Wickrematunga had accused Rajapaksa's defence secretary and brother Gotabhaya of taking kickbacks in arms purchases, and was due to testify in court when he was murdered.

Gotabhaya Rajapaksa has denied running death squads.

The Rajapaksas are under investigation for large-scale financial fraud and murder during Mahinda's presidency, which ended in 2015.

Source: AFP/nc

Courts this week ordered an analysis report on the Defender jeep given in 2011 to Former first lady Shiranthi Rajapaksa to carry out work of her Siriliya Saviya organization to ascertain if any traces of human remains or gunshot residue can be found in it. 

The Courts gave the order following a request by the CID this week and had also previously ordered the Jeep to be taken as evidence.

Magistrate Ranga Dissanayake gave the order after the CID said there is a clear doubt that the Defender may have been used in the abduction of Rugby player Wasim Thajudeen. 

Police was later able to trace the Defender registered under number WP KA - 0642 to Homagama and taken into their custody. CID also reported to courts that the colour of the Defender had been changed twice since the incident adding that sufficient evidence has been found that the jeep was used in the abduction of the Rugby player.

An Indian national arrested for possible links to an alleged plot to assassinate Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena has told a court that he is innocent saying the police are trying to frame him in the case.

Marceli Thomas appeared in court before the Colombo Fort magistrate on Tuesday.

Thomas said in a written statement that he is innocent but the Sri Lankan police's criminal investigation department was trying to implicate him in the plot. He said he had been under detention for 34 days and as a result his health had deteriorated. 

Thomas was arrested late last month following a complaint by Namal Kumara, who claimed he was representing the Anti-Corruption Force, and who had alleged a plot to assassinate Sirisena and Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, the former top defence ministry bureaucrat and brother of ex-president Mahinda Rajapaksa. 

Kumara also claimed that the senior police officer in charge of the police's counter terrorism division Nalaka Silva had masterminded the plot. Silva has since been interdicted and questioned extensively by the police CID. 

The court was also told that voice tapes provided by Kumara and Silva connected to the alleged plot have been verified by the government as carrying their voices. 

Last week, it was reported that Sirisena had accused his senior coalition partner, the United National Party (UNP), of not taking seriously an alleged conspiracy to kill him and Gotabhaya Rajapaksa. A Sri Lankan minister, who declined to be named, had claimed that the president had said India's external intelligence agency Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) was behind the plot. 

The Sri Lankan foreign ministry later termed the reports as "baseless and false".

Sirisena also called up Prime Minister Narendra Modi and categorically rejected the media reports that he had accused the RAW of plotting his assassination as "utterly baseless and false".
(OneIndia)

Following a public bashing of MP Gamini Lokuge by Joint Opposition Parliamentarian Kumara Welgama, Lokuge says he has no need to answer people who have lost their mind. 

Responding to Welgama’s claims that Former Secretary of Defence, Gotabaya Rajapaksa is against democracy, Lokuge says it was Rajapaksa and the Armed forces that protected the democracy of this country for all its people. 

“When you get up on stage and people clap more than deserved even I would feel I can become President,” Lokuge said taking a jab at Welgama who has been vehemently opposing the possibility of Rajapaksa becoming the JO’s presidential candidate.

Sri Lanka on Tuesday called for a "coalition of the willing" to help stabilise free-falling emerging market currencies around the globe, as the beleaguered rupee slumped to fresh lows.

The island's currency bottomed out at a record-low 174.12 rupees to the dollar, resisting a slew of measures by policymakers to arrest its steady decline.

The rupee has shed more than 12 percent of its value this year and Sri Lanka fears it could slide further as US sanctions squeeze Iran, the island's chief source of oil.

A stronger dollar has made it difficult for emerging markets to repay debts and battered global currencies from Turkey to India and Argentina.

Finance Minister Mangala Samaraweera invited those nations experiencing currency crises to visit Colombo and hash out a strategy.
"The rise of the dollar is having a serious impact on our currencies. We are not the only one affected," he told reporters in the Sri Lankan capital.

"I want to build a coalition of the willing to deal with this problem. I don't see the global situation improving any time soon."

Washington pulled out of a landmark 2015 nuclear deal with Iran in May and has been reimposing punishing sanctions on the Islamic republic, targeting in particular its financial system.

Iran not only supplies Sri Lanka with most of its oil, but is one of its chief buyers of the island's celebrated tea.

Samaraweera has warned that blockading Iran will have ripple on effects on Sri Lanka, which has been unable to stop the rupee from nose diving.

Last month, Colombo curbed its state institutions and public servants from importing cars to reduce the outflow of foreign capital.

Banks were also ordered to restrict lending for purchasing overseas and consumer goods, but the rupee has continued its decline.

In August, the government substantially increased taxes on small cars to discourage imports, but officials said there was still pressure on foreign exchange reserves to finance big-ticket imports. (AFP)

The Sri Lanka Army has rejected allegations levelled by the UN which has called for the immediate repatriation of the Commander of its Peacekeeping force in Mali, citing a review of his human rights background, saying that while the Army would comply, they would also appeal.

Military Spokesman Brigadier Sumith Atapattu told the Daily News that it would comply with the UN request and take steps to recall Lt. Col. Amunupure when an official request is received.

“This is merely an allegation, the Commander has not committed any crimes to warrant such an action, hence its our responsibility to appeal upon his return,” he said.

“We will not be sending anyone else in the interim, since this contingent will be completing their mission by the end of this year.”

UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric announced on Friday that the request for Lt. Col. Kalana Amunupure to leave the troubled West African nation was made “based on recently received information.” He gave no details.

“This mission has been in Mali for the last nine months, we find it odd that such intimation has been received many months into the mission. It is noteworthy to mention that this is Lt. Col. Amunupure’s second mission to Mali for which he was granted approval following a stringent vetting process.”

Brigadier Atapattu said that they have only received a verbal request so far and would comply once a formal intimation is received.

“We will comply with the official notification in keeping with protocols. However, the Commander has not committed any crimes and the army is prepared to appeal.” In a response to Inner City Press which had questioned the UN spox on the request for repatriation, they were told the decision was reached following “a review of the human rights background of the Commander.

The Secretariat has requested Sri Lanka to immediately repatriate him. This will be done at their cost, as per normal procedure. This decision to repatriate the commander was made following a review, based on recently received information. The Secretariat remains engaged with the Permanent Mission on this matter.”

Despite the setback, sources say that the Sri Lanka Army is in the process of obtaining clearance for the next contingent which will leave the country next year.

Lt.Col.Kalana Amunupure leads a 200-strong Combat Convoy Company (CCC) contingent which will complete their one year tenure in Mali in December. According to him, 20 officers and 240 other rankers commanded by Lt.Col. K.L.I. Karunanayake with Major P.G.J Suriyasena as his Second-in-Command, would undertake responsibilities in Mali as replacement for the first CCC. (Daily News)