Sri Lankan Air Force expects enhancing surveillance activities with US

Photo courtesy: US Embassy | Colombo

Daily Mirror
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The Sri Lanka Air Force said it hopes to enhance surveillance activities with the United States and thereby both countries could assist each other in monitoring movements on the high seas in the future.

Chief of Defence Staff and Commander of the Air Force, Air Chief Marshal Roshan Goonetileke made this comment addressing an event at the Air Force Base in Ratmalana, where the sophisticated ‘Real Time Data Link system’ facility was officially handed over to the Sri Lanka Air Force by the United States Government.

Sri Lanka Air Force is currently equipped with two Beechcraft SMR 2201 and SMR 2202 which deploys this surveillance system which in the future will continue to assist the nation in its ventures whether humanitarian or development oriented.

Addressing the gathering, Air Chief Marshal Goonetileke said the exchange of this cutting edge technology marks a significant venture in the history of military surveillance between the two countries.

“Surveillance was an extremely important aspect for us as the geographical positioning of our country was in a prominent position in the maritime route,” he said.

Deputy Chief of Mission of the U.S Embassy, Valerie Fowler was Chief Guest at the event. Also present was Chief of the National Air Guard Major Gen Wong, who was on his maiden trip to Sri Lanka, and several other US military representatives currently stationed in the Island. A number of top SLAF officials and staff of the Ratmalana Air Force Base were also in attendance.

Deputy Chief of Mission Ms. Valerie Fowler praised the close coordination and cooperation between the SLAF and the US Embassy. “The shared interest between the two countries in domain awareness and maritime surveillance will be greatly assisted by the usage of this equipment,” she added.

Highlighting the immense capabilities of the Real Time Data Link system, the Chief of National Air Guard Major Gen Wong explained how the equipment can be of immense use in times of natural disaster, fires, earthquakes or floods. He explained how similar usage is already being conducted in Hawai in times of natural disaster, adding that “It’s a great thing for two Air Forces to come together for such ventures.”

© Daily Mirror

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"The Economist" article is a threat to national security" says Sri Lanka Customs

News First
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The Customs Authority is awaiting further instructions from the Director General of the Government Information Department with regard the stock of the latest issue of 'The Economist' magazine, which the Customs Authority had taken into custody.

“The stock of 'The Economist' magazine was taken into custody as it contained an article that was a threat to national security,” said D. J. P. Perera, Deputy Director of Customs at the Air Freight Unit.

Meanwhile, the Director General of the Government Information Department Dr. Ariyarata Athugala said that the government had no intention of preventing the magazine from entering the country.

“Necessary steps will be taken as soon as Customs requested for instructions,” said Athugala.

Meanwhile, Vijitha Yapa, the Chairman of the Vijitha Yapa Associates, the exclusive distributor of The Economist magazine in Sri Lanka, said that an article titled 'Sri Lanka's Post War Recovery – Rebuilding, But at a Cost', was in the latest issue.

© The Economist

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Sri Lankan exporters brace for life without EU tax breaks

AFP | Arab Times
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Sri Lankan exporters braced for hard times as the EU's withdrawal of import concessions took effect Sunday after Colombo's refusal to allow scrutiny of its human rights record.

Sri Lanka has long been a preferred source for top high streets brands and its garment, china and other exports enjoyed lower European Union tariffs under a concession known as the Generalised System of Preference Plus (GSP+).

But when the concession came up for renewal last year, Sri Lanka's hawkish government refused EU demands for a probe into war crimes allegedly committed in 2009 during the last months of the country's ethnic civil war.

"We are heading into difficult, uncertain times with the end to the concessions," Sunil Wijesinghe, who heads Japanese-owned Dankotuwa Porcelain in the village of Dankotuwa, north of Colombo, told AFP.

Business executives said they understood EU concerns, but warned that cancelling tax breaks that gave Sri Lanka preferential access to the vast European market in return for commitments on social and rights issues would achieve little.

If the EU's objective is to improve human rights, the withdrawal of tax breaks "is not going to make it better. If at all, it will make it worse," Wijesinghe said.

Industry bodies estimate the EU trade concessions were worth 1.5 billion dollars annually, even as Colombo played down the impact of the loss, estimating it at 150 million dollars.

The loss of the concessions comes as Sri Lankan exporters are already reeling from a weak recovery in Western markets.

Dankotuwa Porcelain has suffered a 25 percent drop in orders as Europe has been mired in an economic downturn and the loss of tax breaks is a further blow, Wijesinghe said.

He said the company had stripped overheads to a minimum, with cuts in overtime and an end to subsidised loans, free food, shoes, picnics, year-end parties and free school supplies for employees' children.

The fear on the factory floor is that jobs could be the next to go.

"If the company collapses, we are not qualified enough to get another job," said factory worker Neetha Rajani.

But companies say withdrawing GSP+ will hurt most Sri Lanka's apparel industry, which is the country's biggest industrial export sector and employs over a million people in 250 factories clustered around the capital Colombo.

"We will lose around 500 million dollars from our annual earnings of just under three billion dollars," said Rohan Masakorale, secretary general of the Joint Apparel Association Forum (JAAF), an industry body.

JAAF says some European buyers may pick up the extra 10 percent in taxes or share it with local manufacturers, but others may shift their business to rival countries.

"Some factories (in Sri Lanka) may close, there will be more consolidation going forward," Masakorale told AFP.

Currently 45 percent of garments are shipped to US buyers like Victoria's Secret and Masakorale says the forum is pressing the government to strike new trade deals with Japan, Australia, Brazil and Russia.

"We are looking at different markets and trying not to depend on the EU. Even a five-percent increase in other markets would help," Masakorale said.

The withdrawal of the EU tax concessions comes at a time when exporters are suffering from thin profit margins.

Apparel makers' costs have gone up by 10-12 percent over the past year, said A. Sukumaran, who heads one of Sri Lanka's biggest apparel manufacturer's, Star Garments.

"We're already working on thin margins. We're not able to reduce our costs any further as economic fundamentals are working against us," Sukumaran said.

© Arab Times

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SRI LANKA: Enjoying revenge

By Basil Fernando | Asian Human Rights Commission
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Two cabinet ministers laughed in public about the police assault of two opposition Members of Parliament at the Galle police station. They added to their laughter by adding to the story, saying that nothing else is to be expected when anyone tries to assault police officers inside a police station. That was a twist to their merriment. The two ministers were also showing that truth is whatever they say it is. Truth was unimportant. They also referred to JVP’s past, saying they have done this kind of thing in the past. Ha, Ha, Ha.

If a Tory MP was assaulted, by some strange chance, the reaction of the Labor government (or vice versa) would be very different. There would have been an expression of horror and immediately there would have been action against the police officers through a high level inquiry. The political coloring of the victim MPS would have been irrelevant. The status of the Members of the Parliament would have been the primary consideration. All attempts would been taken to assure the public that such things are not taken lightly.

The least that the two ministers could have done before they opened their mouth on the incident was call for an inquiry and to wait for the report. That way they could have kept their own dignity and helped to preserve the dignity of the position of the members of parliament.

Such merriment as expressed by the two ministers is no exception to the general norm in Sri Lanka. There is jubilation in many quarters and at highest levels about the decision to remove the four stars from Sarath Fonseka. There is sheer joy in teaching ‘A LESSON TO THE FORMER COMMANDER OF THE ARMY.’ This merriment will not go away soon. There will be more and more actions against him and the joke will be enjoyed for very many years.

While the wife of Prageeth Eknaligoda is offering Yathikas at the Kali Amma Kovil at Mutuwal, there is a lot jubilation and laughter from those who are behind this disappearance. Have whatever Yathika you like; we have done what we wanted to. Not finger is moved to start any investigation. Now, Sarath Fonseka’s wife has joined in such prayers. All that adds to the merriment of those who enjoy the acts of their power.

The same type of merriment of was orchestrated on the streets when Prabakaran was killed. There was eating of kiribath in the streets. It is similar kind of “joy” that goes on still.

Two incidents reported recently demonstrate psychopathology of this kind of revengeful joy. One incident was reported from Nivithigala, Ratnapura. A man who was travelling for a wedding with his whole family had his head severed from the body by an enemy who used the situation to take his revenge. A few weeks back a case was reported from Eppawela where a young nephew living with a family killed his uncle, aunt and two cousins to take revenge for some grievance.

It is similar type of enjoyment of revenge that we are witnessing in the political scene. More of such things seem to on the way. If the logic of this psychology has more persons disappearing like Prageeth Ekneligoda, it would no surprise. JVP MPS in particular may become targets of worse things than police assaults.

© AHRC

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Hambantota in the eyes of major world powers

By M.S.M.Ayub | Daily Mirror
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It is interesting to note that the major rival countries attempt to use Sri Lanka for their economic as well as strategic ends, while Sri Lanka, in turn, uses the same concerns of those very countries for its economic as well as security needs. In a way, it could be interpreted that Sri Lanka, after committing blunders in handling the international forces in the eighties, have been somewhat successful in managing those forces, in spite of it being repeatedly accused of human rights violations by some of those countries.

However, the current increasing involvement of the major powers, especially India, China and the US in Sri Lanka’s economic field is being taken by many as Sri Lanka increasingly becoming a seat of power play for those forces.

India constantly has an eye on the developments in Sri Lanka. The ethnic strife in Sri Lanka continued to be an eyesore to India creating a situation of dilemma for the Indian leaders.

India’s dilemma concerning the developments in Sri Lanka stems from both its bitter past experience involving the Indian troops, the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) between 1987 and 1990 and the assassination of its former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1991,on one hand, and its strategic interests in the region, on the other.

Sri Lanka’s need for crushing the Tamil rebels necessitated it to obtain more and more weapons, military training and funding from other countries. The Sri Lankan leaders strengthened links, in this regard, with Pakistan, China and the US. And more international involvement began to take shape with the signing of the ceasefire agreement between the Government and the LTTE in 2002, by way of a ceasefire monitoring and international assistance for the rehabilitation of the northern and eastern provinces.

One option left with India to minimize fingering by other powerful countries in Sri Lanka endangering its strategic interests was to fulfil Sri Lanka’s needs. However, the homogeneity of the peoples across the Palk Strait (in northern Sri Lanka and South India) which always invited spillovers of Sri Lankan tensions across the Strait into Tamilnadu had restrained India from doing this.

The upshot, which seems to be an attempt to strike a balance, was a latent Indian stance on Sri Lanka’s ethnic strife, with signs of support to the Sri Lankan government’s military efforts at times as well as signs of sympathy towards Tamil concerns at some other times.

Also Sri Lankan leaders seem to attempt to use India’s concerns for the country’s military as well as development needs. India was given access to build a coal power plant in Sampur in close proximity to Trincomalee. Interestingly India along with its rival in the region, China has been selected to rebuild the northern railway line that was destroyed by the LTTE.

The idea behind involving India seemed to be that when Indian interests increase in the north and east, the giant neighbour would have to have a stake in the security sector as well, in those areas. A bridge between the two countries was under consideration during former Prime Minister Ranil Wikremesinghe’ time.

In June last year Sri Lanka had submitted a proposal to India on renovating parts of the strategic Kankesanthurai (KKS) harbour. For India, presence at KKS would be important because of its proximity to its southern coast. This had to be viewed with India’s seeming interest in the Trincomalee harbour.

However, the vacuum created by India’s dilemma on providing support to Sri Lanka’s military effort against the LTTE before May, last year, was also filled somewhat by China by helping Sri Lanka with military hardware as well as economic assistance. The crown of the recent Chinese support to Sri Lanka was the agreement on Hambantota harbour, near one of the world's biggest shipping lanes. However, considering the strategic contest between India and China in the Indian Ocean region, any India-Sri Lana deal does not seem to be match with the deal to fund the Hambantota harbour project by China. The primary objective of the Hambantota project is to synchronize different aspects of development such as shipping, trans-shipment, shipbuilding, and catering to increase exports and imports, for which the Port of Colombo does not have enough space and facilities.

Major powers in the world seem not to consider the Hambantota project merely as an economic venture, given the geographical location of Sri Lanka. The country lies astride the major sea lanes of communication from Europe to East Asia and the oil tanker routes from the oil producing countries of the Gulf to China, Japan and other Pacific countries. In the military sense it is important to the United States as these same sea routes are used for transference of naval power from the Pacific Ocean to the Indian Ocean and the Gulf.

On last Thursday, the “Japan Times” said that “China's involvement in Sri Lanka has inevitably raised speculation that Hambantota is the latest jewel in a so-called “string of pearls” that will pave the way for China's rapidly expanding navy to operate routinely in the Indian Ocean from secure bases in the region.” The phrase “string of pearls,” is one that was first used by a U.S. Navy study for the Pentagon. China's other "pearls" in southern Asia include the port of Gwadar in Pakistan.

Apart from this, a China-Sri Lanka agreement will finance the building of a highway from Colombo to the international airport in Katunayaka. China also has offered an $891 million, 20-year loan with a 2 percent interest rate to build the second and third phases of the 900 megawatt coal-fired Norochcholai power plant.

Meanwhile, China’s increasing involvement has seemingly prompted the US too to re-evaluate its approach towards Sri Lanka. This has been very openly said in the report titled “SRI LANKA: RECHARTING U.S. STRATEGY AFTER THE WAR” and issued by the Committee on the Foreign Relations of the US Senate on December 7, last year. Here are some of the randomly picked up parts from the report.

“As Western countries became increasingly critical of the Sri Lankan Government’s handling of the war and human rights record, the Rajapaksa leadership cultivated ties with such countries as Burma, China, Iran, and Libya. ……..

“This strategic drift will have consequences for U.S. interests in the region. Along with our legitimate humanitarian and political concerns, U.S. policymakers have tended to underestimate Sri Lanka’s geo-strategic importance for American interests. Sri Lanka is located at the nexus of crucial maritime trading routes in the Indian Ocean connecting Europe and the Middle East to China and the rest of Asia. ……..

“The United States cannot afford to ‘‘lose’’ Sri Lanka. ….

“The Obama administration is currently weighing a new strategy for relations with Sri Lanka. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee has closely followed events on the ground this year …

The recommendations include a broader and more robust U.S. approach to Sri Lanka that appreciates new political and economic realities in Sri Lanka and U.S. geo-strategic interests; ……….”

© Daily Mirror

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Sri Lanka: School drop-out rate high among plantation Tamils

The Island
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A survey conducted by Transparency International Sri Lanka (TISL) has revealed that the drop-out rate among primary students is significantly higher (8.4%) in plantation schools than elsewhere. The average primary school drop-out rate in Sri Lanka is a low 1.4%, a press release issued by the TISL said yesterday.

The TISL says: "The survey also revealed that 10% to 25% students drop out from the schools every year in the plantation sector. These alarming figures underline the need for more determined action to retain students at school.

This finding confirms that only 7% of students in the plantation sector who pass their Ordinary Level examination continue to the GCE (Advanced Level) and fewer than one per cent of them complete their GCE (A/L) and enter university. The students who are in the secondary level are poor in major subjects like mathematics, science, English and social studies.

In the estate sector, there are 830 schools with approximately 199,200 students.

The survey was done in 21 schools in the Badulla district and over 300 students, teachers and parents were interviewed.

Lack of transport facilities, school buildings being unsafe, the poor condition of classrooms and the lack of desks, chairs, blackboards, learning materials such as textbooks, writing books, pens and pencils and also drinking water and sanitation have been attributed to the low educational achievements in the plantation schools.

Poverty and lack of parental support are frequently quoted as reasons for the high drop-out rate while the lack of interest and support of parents was seen as a major impediment to school attendance and performance, with a major factor being the absence of mothers who had sought employment in the Middle East as housemaids. The survey has revealed that many social ills such as alcoholism, fatalism, low self-value and low awareness of rights befell the households when the mothers went abroad for work."

© The Island

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• student drop-out rate in estate schools alarming (Daily Mirror)
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