Four US government officials will be visiting Sri Lanka over the next two weeks, the US embassy confirmed on Thursday.
The visitors include two from the US State Department - Thomas O. Melia, Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, and Dr. Alyssa Ayres, Deputy Assistant Secretary for South and Central Asia, as well as, Holly Vineyard, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Africa, the Middle East, and South Asia at the U.S. Department of Commerce, and Ambassador James A. Larocco from the Near East South Asia Center for Strategic Studies at the U.S. Department of Defense National Defense University.
According to the press statement published on Thursday, in addition to meeting with officials from the Sri Lankan government, the US officials will be meeting with "civil society representatives, business leaders and political leaders".
Earlier this month, the head of the newly formed Office of Civilian Security, Democracy and Human Rights, Maria Otero, announced that the State Department would, as part of a "bold foreign policy statement" be seeking to engage non-state actors as a means of ultimately protecting individuals and addressing civilian security.
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