Sri Lanka
  

It is likely that targets will be set for each mission in the current year and beyond. Other topics on the agenda are the importance of effective outreach; diaspora relations; new and emerging forms of partnership including the US-Sri Lanka Open Government Partnership and Trans-Pacific Partnership; strategic importance of the Indian Ocean, National reconciliation and the initiatives under way to promote peace building.

The Open Government Partnership is a multilateral initiative launched by the United States in 2011 to provide an international platform for domestic reformers committed to making their governments more open, accountable, and responsive to citizens, which Sri Lanka signed in 2015. The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is a trade agreement among 12 Pacific rim countries signed on February 4, 2016, in Auckland, New Zealand. Sri Lanka is exploring the possibility of joining the TPP.

Diplomats could be asked to come up with concrete proposals under all areas to be discussed and vagueness or rhetorical expressions are likely to be rejected, informed sources said. It is expected that there will be separate boardroom type meetings, where each Diplomat will make a presentation on the goals and targets, possibly before the PM

The Cabinet of Ministers approved drafting a new bill to combat illegal and unregulated poaching in Sri Lankan waters, replacing the Fisheries and Aquatic Resources Act No. 2 of 1996.

Sri Lanka Police has suspended its annual transfer orders for 2025 for six months. The suspension was based on a directive from Acting Inspector General of Police (IGP) Priyantha Weerasooriya on 24 December.

The National People's Power (NPP) is to contest the upcoming Local Government (LG) and Provincial Council (PC) Elections under its current structure, with the groups currently aligned with them.

The government is yet to assign vehicles to the MPs of the new Parliament though it has taken a policy decision to do so. Public Security Minister Ananda Wijepala told Daily Mirror yesterday that the government is currently in the process of auctioning luxury vehicles. He said most of the MPs were using their own vehicles at the moment.

Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna had decided to go to court over reducing the strength of security provided to former President Mahinda Rajapaksa.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry announced on Monday that it would disclose details about Sri Lankan President Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s planned official visit to China in mid-January “in a timely manner.”

The government will conduct fresh probes into the scams involved in the import of a stock of biofertilizer from China and in the introduction of organic farming during the time of former President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, a minister said yesterday.

Cabinet spokesman Minister Nalinda Jayatissa said today that the people will know whether the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) MPs had sought assistance from the President’s Fund as claimed by SJB MP Dayasiri Jayasekara when the rest of the list is released soon.

The circular issued by the Western Province Education Zonal Ministry prohibiting private tutoring classes for students by school teachers, along with the letter issued by the Education Ministry regarding modulators, has been withdrawn, Parliamentarian Mahinda Jayasinghe said.

Adding further controversy to the misuse of the President’s Fund, Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) MP Dayasiri Jayasekera yesterday said some of JVP members also sought assistance from the President’s funds prior to 2010.