Tag Archives: Sri Lanka

For now, ethnic tensions appear to be on hold. The common foe is the Rajapaksa family, as protesters demand that the president and prime minister step down.

With US president-elect Joe Biden due to be inaugurated in January 2021, the time is ripe to reassess the state of China–Sri Lanka relations given Sri Lanka’s strategic location in the center of the Indian Ocean.

This spring marks the 25th anniversary of the Rwandan genocide and the 10th year since the Tamil genocide in Sri Lanka. The world knows what happened in Rwanda. But Sri Lanka's is largely ignored.

The Sri Lankan attacks have all signs of being a classic “false” flag operation of RAW. The end motive is to malign and further demonize Muslims the world over, at the same time goad the Muslims emotionally into further reaction so that they can be confirmed labelled as a terrorist religion.

Sri Lanka will enter a critical phase of its economic reforms in 2018. In order to reap the full benefits of macroeconomic stability, the government should balance some quick policy fixes with deeper reforms.

The gloomy short-term economic forecast is bound to test the strength of Sri Lanka’s ruling coalition. In managing painful economic reforms, the government’s hard work is only beginning.

It appears that Sri Lanka is in for some tough negotiations with the IMF. It has to address the structural issues, bring in financial reform to expand the tax base, reduce unnecessary expenditure and address the budget deficit. And it must do all these in a difficult political climate.

The sharp drop in oil prices is helping to turn around Sri Lanka’s external current account, but remittance earnings are being hit hard, while export earnings remain in negative territory. The impact of global developments is only one side of the story. More compelling is the government’s capitulation to reform inertia.

The full extent of India’s involvement in the Sri Lankan elections in January 2015 and again in August 2015 remains unclear, but there is little doubt that New Delhi was at least able to unite Tamil groups against Rajapaksa, no doubt lubricated with plenty of money.

A group of Western officials after a study tour of Pakistan, Sri Lanka and India, have some interesting impressions about the three countries, especially India.