International Affairs

Cabinet approval has been granted to exempt 46 countries from visa fees, said Tourism and Christian Affairs Minister John Amaratunge.

A security delegation of Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) would visit Pakistan in August to conduct a security assessment to seek the possibility of playing the upcoming two-match Test series, foreign news agencies reported yesterday.

The ‘Friends of Sri Lanka Group’ was relaunched by the newly-elected European Parliament in Strasbourg on 17 July. Group Chairman, MEP and British Conservative Geoffrey Van Orden, who founded the Friends Group in 2006 made the opening remarks. Ambassador-Designate of Sri Lanka Grace Asirwatham, who recently assumed duties in Brussels, was welcomed by the Members of Friends Group.

An Australian Government charter plane carrying failed Sri Lankan asylum seekers left Christmas Island for Colombo today, just days after their vessel was intercepted in the Indian Ocean.

The Korea-South Asia Inter-Parliamentary Diplomacy Forum, initiated by Republic of Korea Speaker of the National Assembly Moon Hee Sang, was launched at the National Assembly of the Republic of Korea on 18 July, with the intention of strengthening Inter-Parliamentary Diplomacy with the South Asian countries.

The Asahi Shimbun: An organisation that assists refugees is criticising immigration officials for singling out and discriminating against Sri Lankan nationals seeking to enter Japan by asking them if they face possible difficulties returning home.

ඇමරිකානු ආරක්‍ෂක දෙපාර්තමේන්තුවට අයත් හමුදා නිලධාරීන් සහ සිවිල් සේවකයන් ශී‍්‍ර ලංකාව තුළ තාවකාලිකව රැුඳී සිටින්නේ ශී‍්‍ර ලංකා රජයේ ඇරයුම මත බව ඇමරිකානු තානාපතිනි ඇලෙයිනා ටෙප්ලිස්ට් මුල්වරට පිළිගෙන ඇත.

The High-Level Forum on sustainable development and the High Level Segment of Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) meeting was held from 8 to 19 July at the United Nations (UN) Head Quarters in New York and this important event was attended by over 125 heads of states or their representatives and over 2,000 participants from countries with representative of development partners, academia and civil society representatives. The theme of the Forum for the year 2019 was on empowering people and ensuring inclusiveness and equality.

The United States Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) Sri Lanka Compact has no bearing on land ownership, administration and management in the island, US diplomatic sources said.

Air India has announced the launch of Mumbai-Colombo from September and will resume its second daily flight to Colombo from New Delhi.

For business travellers to New Delhi, the second frequency enables them greater flexibility in their business schedules.

“These flights also will now offer a spectrum of both International and Domestic flight connections to many destinations via New Delhi and Mumbai.

Air India passengers with onward travel from Delhi or Mumbai can experience the comfort of flying on Boeing 787 Dreamliner to Europe and Boeing 777 to America,” a spokesman for Indu Sky Aviation Ltd., the General Sales Agent for Air India, said.

Air India will also commence Delhi-Toronto flights on the occasion of World Tourism Day on 27 September.

Additional frequencies also being introduced with effect from 19 September from Delhi to Seoul and Mumbai to Hong Kong.

The following new and additional connections are introduced for the Domestic network: From Delhi to Indore, Kolkata, Chandigarh, Bagdogra, Amritsar, Bhopal and Raipur and from Chennai to Bangalore, Ahmadabad, Varanasi, Kolkata, Vizag and from Mumbai to Delhi, Bangalore.

Air India said after a five-month hiatus, the Pakistan airspace is once more open for commercial aviation and all affinity flights of Air India to London, Birmingham, Paris, Milan, Rome, Frankfurt, Madrid, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Tel Aviv, and Vienna are now just one hour to 90 minutes connecting time via the Delhi hub, with no longer layovers.

Japan continues its Grant Assistance for Grass-roots Human Security Projects (GGP) in Sri Lanka providing financial assistance to non-profit, development-oriented organizations to support community development projects.

The United States wants a special forces cooperation agreement with Sri Lanka to sidestep bureaucracy and has no intention of setting up a military base in the country, the US Ambassador to Sri Lanka said in a television interview, the Reuters reported.

Sri Lanka is lagging behind Uganda, a low income country in financial information and due diligence reporting standards, Committee on Public Finance (COPF) in its latest report revealed.

The Archbishop of Canterbury His Grace Rt. Rev. Justin Welby and Mrs. Welby are scheduled to visit Sri Lanka from the 29th – 31st August 2019.

The Special Rapporteur on the rights of freedom of association and peaceful assembly, Clément Nyaletsossi Voule began his official country visit to Sri Lanka from July 18 to 26 by calling on Foreign Minister Tilak Marapana at the Foreign Affairs Ministry on Thursday (18).

ශ්‍රී ලංකා දුම්රිය සේවයට එක් කිරීම සඳහා එස් - 13 ද්විත්ව බලවේග කට්ටලයක් සහ එම් - 11 එන්ජිමක් ශ්‍රී ලංකාවට ගෙන්වා තිබෙනවා. මේ වනවිට මෙම එස් - 13 ද්විත්ව බලවේග කට්ටලය සහ එම් - 11 එන්ජිම කොළඹ වරායට ගොඩබා තිබෙන බවයි ප්‍රවාහන හා සිවිල් ගුවන් සේවා අමාත්‍යංශය පවසන්නේ. ඉන්දීය ණය ආධාර යටතේ මේවා ශ්‍රී ලංකාවට ගෙන්වා තිබෙනවා.

එක්සත් ජාතීන්ගේ විශේෂ නියෝජිත ක්ලෙමන්ට් නිසාලෙයිට් සොසී මෙරටට පැමිණ ඇත්තේ පාස්කු ඉරිදා ප‍්‍රහාරය සම්බන්ධයෙන් අත්අඩංගුවට ගනු ලැබූ 2000 කට අධික තව්හිද් ජමාත් කි‍්‍රයාකාරීන් සහ කුරුණෑගල මව්වරුන් වඳභාවයට පත් කළ බව කියන වෛද්‍ය ෂාෆි පිළිබඳව විමර්ශනය කිරීමට බව හෙළිවී ඇත.

Addressing the Plenary of the Second Ministerial for Advancing Religious Freedom hosted by the US State Department on 18 July in Washington D.C., Ambassador of Sri Lanka to the US Rodney Perera, while thanking delegations present for their expression of sympathy, solidarity and support, mentioned that the people of Sri Lanka have lived side-by-side amicably irrespective of ethnic and religious differences for centuries, and that they continue to do so.