Apr 26 (TN) The North East Provincial Education, Cultural Affairs, Sports and Youth Affairs Ministry has organised a Science and Mathematics Quiz Competition for students from Grade 1 to Grade 11 in all twenty four-education zones in the province, in a bid to enhance the knowledge of the students in science and mathematics, more..

Apr 26 (TN) The Tamil Eelam Police Service (TEPS) has released a Sinhalese contract worker arrested last year for carrying a concealed T-56 rifle in Paranthan to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), sources said. more..

Apr 26 (TN) Seven Liberation Tigers were killed by an unidentified armed group in Batticaloa Sunday night around 11.30 p.m. Four of the murdered LTTE cadres were invalids, sources said. They were killed at Ponnaankaanichenai, about 1.5 kilometres from the Sri Lanka army's point northwest of Batticaloa town. more..

Apr 26 (SLA) A Tamil man, suspected to be from LTTE had blown up himself in the general area of POLWATTAPITIYA, KURUNEGALA during early hours on Monday (26 April 2004) for reasons yet to be identified. more..

Apr 26 (SLA) An eighteen-year old youth has been abducted from VAVUNIYA area by an unidentified group of men on 24 April 2004. The Muslim youth, MOHOMMAD NIZAM of No. 263, MAHARAMBAIKULAM, has been abducted by three motorbike-riding men while he was in the general area of VAVUNIYA. more..

Apr 26 (SLA) A Tamil man roaming in the area close to the main entrance of the Navy Headquarters in COLOMBO was taken in for questioning by naval troops and handed over to the FORT Police station for further investigations on 24 April 2004. more..

Apr 26 (SLA) An explosion occurred inside a computer institute in the general area of NAVANTHURAI, about 2.5 km north of JAFFNA town on 24 April 2004 caused damages to the building and a computer. Though there were no casualties reported, walls of the building were damaged as a result of the explosion. more..

Apr 26 (CI) Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) have denied reporting match referee Chris Broad to the ICC for "boozing" with Australia's players during the recent series. Mohan de Silva, the president of SLC, claims that he was misquoted by a reporter from the state-run Sunday Observer newspaper. more..

Apr 26 (AP) Sri Lanka is willing to develop non-official ties with Taiwan, according to Sri Lanka's former commerce minister Kingsley T. Wickramaratne. Wickramaratne, who was on Hainan Island, mainland China for the Boao Forum of Asia said that bilateral trade between Sri Lanka and Taiwan was growing, despite the absence of diplomatic ties. more..

Apr 26 (Dawn) The new Prime Minister, Mahinda Rajapakse, would go down in history as the first prime minister to hand over his resignation letter a week after his appointment. The letter was, according to sources, asked for by the president. more..

Apr 26 (CI) Bruce Elliott, the biomechanics expert in charge of assessing Muttiah Muralitharan's doosra, has criticised the Sri Lankan board for jumping the gun and partially leaking the results of Muralitharan's tests to the media, a move which he believes confused the issue and put pressure on the ICC. more..

Apr 26 (OneWorld) The issue of child soldiers has triggered a controversy in Sri Lanka, where the future of 1000 children released by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) over the past two weeks, remains uncertain. more..

Apr 26 (AFP) Tamil Tiger rebels demanded that talks be based on their proposal for self-rule after the president sought to restart negotiations in a move seen as aimed at securing support for her shaky government. more..

Apr 26 (DN) President Kumaratunga as Minister of Education will have her first round of discussions with the senior officials of the Ministry, University Grants Commission and the Vice Chancellors of Universities today at the President's House as her first step towards reviving the education sector of the country. more..

Apr 26 (AT) On the orders of the High Command of the LTTE in Vanni, it is reliably learnt that 5 former prominent commanders of Colonel Karuna were suddenly taken to Vanni from the Amparai Districts. According to information, those taken to Vanni were taken under heavy armed guards. more..

Apr 26 (AT) Allegedly under the direct influence of the UNP and the owners of the Upali newspapers Ltd., �The Sunday Island� newspaper charged in an editorial that the two rebel monks of the Jathika Hela Urumaya were abducted by the government party. more..

Apr 26 (AFP) Police on Monday sent anti-terrorism units to investigate an explosion that killed a man who was suspected to have been carrying a bomb, officials said. The mutilated body of the man was found after residents heard a loud pre-dawn explosion in the north-western district of Kurunegala Monday, more..

Apr 26 (Reuters) Zimbabwe captain Tatenda Taibu said it was important for his weakened team to support one another after they were skittled by Sri Lanka for a world record low of 35 in the third one-day international on Sunday. more..

Apr 26 (HT) The LTTE have laid down their conditions for the resumption of peace talks with the government. LTTE's political advisor and chief negotiator, Anton Balasingham, made it clear that his organization would come for talks with the UPFA government only if the latter recognized its status as the "sole" representative of the Tamil people. more..

Apr 26 (AFP) Sri Lanka's influential Buddhist monks called for police protection from a spate of attacks against temples and monks after an all-clergy party defeated the government's candidate for speaker. more..

Apr 26 (Reuters) Sri Lanka's Tamil Tigers have accused fighters loyal to a breakaway rebel leader of killing seven of their members, in the first violence since the Tigers retook the eastern area he controlled earlier this month. more..

Apr 26 (AFP) Sri Lanka's peace broker Norway has made no decision on sending a team here following a request from President Chandrika Kumaratunga to help revive talks with Tamil Tiger rebels, a spokeswoman said. more..

Apr 26 (TN) �The murder of our disabled cadres is clearly the work of criminal elements that are working with the Sri Lanka army. I have requested the SLMM to arrange an early meeting with the SLA to discuss this matter. I hope this would be the last incident of this sort. more..

Apr 26 (LBO) Accounting experts say local companies should invest more in voluntary social and environmental reporting, since indifference could be costly. It is cheaper for companies to clean up their act and behave in a socially and environmentally responsible fashion now, than wait for the government to enforce regulations, say experts. more..

Apr 26 (LBO) The upward trend in international urea prices will continue to push urea costs up and will erode the fixed fertiliser subsidy together with benefits to farmers, warn market analysts. The new UPFA government will increase the fertiliser subsidy from May, reducing the selling price of Urea from Rs.800 per 50 kg bag to Rs.600. more..

Apr 26 (LBO) Ahead of a donor aid review on Sri Lanka in May, the World Bank will plough in US$ 1.5 mn for housing reconstruction in the North and East. The programme will cover 326,000 houses and families in vulnerable areas, with a sustainable housing finance mechanism for the area to be developed. more..

Apr 26 (HT) Despite getting overwhelming voter support in the April 02 parliamentary elections and in last week's elections to the North Western Provincial Council, the UPFA is yet to find its feet as a ruling party in Sri Lanka. It is groping in the dark in many matters of vital importance to the country, including the peace process and talks with the LTTE. more..

Apr 26 (IANS) Sri Lanka's Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar will arrive here Wednesday on an official visit, his first visit abroad since a new government took office in Colombo this month. Kadirgamar will hold extensive discussions with his Indian counterpart Yashwant Sinha. more..

Apr 27 (CI) Sri Lanka have decided to rest five of their key players, including their captain Marvan Atapattu, for the fourth one-day international against Zimbabwe in Harare tomorrow. In Atapattu's absence, Mahela Jayawardene will captain his country for the first time, more..

Apr 27 (TN) Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU), the party of ultra Sinhala nationalist Buddhist monks, Monday charged that the Marxist JVP, President Chandrika Kumaratunga�s chief coalition partner, is planning to eliminate its leaders. more..

Apr 27 (TN) Mr. Kanagasabai Thurairajasingham was killed in an explosion early morning at about 3 a.m. Monday at Polathapitiya near Kurunagala town in the northwestern province. He was later identified as a member of a Tamil group, probably a supporter of the renegade Karuna group, police said Monday. more..

Apr 27 (TN) The politburo of the JVP began its crucial discussion Monday evening on the alternative suggestions submitted by President, Ms. Chandrika Kumaratunge, in regard to the allocation of Mahaveli Development Ministry to JVP, political sources said. more..

Apr 27 (AP) India and Pakistan will clash again at the six-nation Asia Cup starting in July in Sri Lanka, a cricket official said on Monday. The Colombo tournament will be the first official encounter between the two South Asian rivals since India�s March-April tour of Pakistan. more..

Apr 27 (Hindu) A fortnight after the LTTE established ground-level control in eastern Batticaloa district, it has complained that seven of its cadres were killed last night in areas under its control by "cadres loyal to Karuna," the expelled eastern military commander, who had disbanded his fighters and left for an undisclosed location earlier this month. more..

Apr 27 (HRW) The LTTE, an armed opposition group in Sri Lanka, must halt all efforts to recruit recently released child soldiers, Human Rights Watch said today. International agencies in eastern Sri Lanka should actively monitor the situation to help ensure the safety of hundreds of threatened children. more..

Apr 27 (TN) Foundation stones were laid Monday morning for the construction of a pre-school and a multi purpose hall in the resettled Kanniya village, located on the Trincomalee- Anuradhapura road about 8 km north of Trincomalee town. more..

Apr 27 (TN) "I dare say that the government has no right to rule our people as it has failed to provide assistance to hundreds of thousands internally displaced who have been languishing in refugee camps and welfare centres to return to their lands and resettle," said the TNA parliamentary group leader, Mr.R.Sampanthan, more..

Apr 27 (AFP) JVP yesterday ended a standoff with President over allocation of portfolios that has triggered instability in the new minority government. JVP said it accepted a compromise offered by Kumaratunga to end the 16-day cabinet crisis and eight of its legislators will be sworn in tomorrow as ministers and deputies. more..

Apr 27 (TN) The people who were rendered refugees and were displaced during the war in 1985 from Kevuliyamadu in the Batticaloa district have demanded that they be allowed to resettle in their village, sources said. more..

Apr 27 (TN) Unidentified gunmen shot dead a youth and wounded another in Maligawatte, a congested suburb near downtown Colombo, Monday night around 10 p.m. Police said. The youth are from Batticaloa, according to Police sources. The gunmen who shot the youth while they were negotiating an apartment for rent in Maligawatte got away. more..

Apr 27 (Reuters) Stocks ended lower on Tuesday on selling in rarely traded counters, while blue chips remained lacklustre over worries about the direction and stability of the island's new government. The key Colombo all-share index closed down 0.39 percent, more..

Apr 27 (SLA) Dead bodies of four LTTE cadres, suspected to have been killed by some rival LTTE cadres, were brought to the cleared areas through the Entry/Exit point at BLACK BRIDGE, about 14 km northwest of BATTICALOA town on 26 April 2004 around 7.00 p.m. more..

Apr 27 (SLA) A group of about twenty armed and uniform-clad LTTE cadres, who reached closer to the northeast of the eastern defence line in the general area of MUTTUR on 26 April 2004 around 8.00 a.m., had carried out small arms firing for reasons best known only to them. more..

Apr 27 (wsws) The Sri Lankan Socialist Equality Party (SEP) held a public lecture in Colombo on April 21 to oppose the US neo-colonial occupation of Iraq and support the popular uprising of the Iraqi masses. more..

Apr 27 (LT) The snag that had occurred between the JVP and the SLFP regarding the ministerial subjects has been amicably resolved says internal sources of the two parties. As such, the four Ministers and the four Deputy Ministers named by the JVP will be sworn in by the President on Wednesday morning. more..

Apr 27 (AN) Stranded Sri Lankan housemaids were given new clothes as part of the island�s celebrations in the Kingdom. Sri Lankans throughout the Kingdom celebrated the dawn of their new year last week in Riyadh, Jeddah and Dammam. more..

Apr 27 (Rupavahini) President Kumaratunge has decided to speed up the process of the speedway projects. Accordingly, work on the Colombo - Katunayaka, Colombo - Matara, Colombo - Kandy, Katunayaka -Anuradhapura high speed ways and the Colombo circular road would be re-launched. more..

Apr 27 (Rupavahini) According to the Ratnapura district secretary, Mrs. Malani Premaratne, meteorologists have warned that floods could occur between May and June or from June to July. The district secretary explained this position at a district coordinating committee meeting held this morning. more..

Apr 27 (PSL) Minister of Education President Chandrika Kumaratunga met with senior officials of the Education Ministry, the University Grants Commission and Vice Chancellors on Monday, April 26, at President�s House, Colombo. more..

Apr 27 (KN) MDMK leader Vaiko Monday petitioned the Madras High Court for withdrawal of a case against him under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA). The Tamil Nadu Government had slapped the case against him for allegedly supporting the outlawed Tamil Tigers guerrillas of Sri Lanka while addressing a public meeting in June 2002 at Tirumangalam near Madurai. more..