Sri Lankan minister SB Dissanayake said the time has come to protect President Mahinda Rajapaksa as there are attempts to “create another war”, Colombo Gazette reported.

The Higher Education Minister said that groups on the island are attempting to divide the country and destabilise the nation, funded by “powerful countries”.

The National Freedom Front, an ally in the Rajapaksa-led UPFA coalition, has warned Muslims in Sri Lanka on “following Arabic culture” in the clothes they wear, as it could lead to divisions amongst the communities, reported Colombo Gazette.

Media Spokesman of the NFF, Mohammed Muzammil said that historically, Muslim women in Sri Lanka covered their heads using the saari and not the ‘Abaya’, which is prevalent in the Middle East.

The Sunday Times reported the MoU will be signed when China's President Xi Jingping visits Colombo on September 16^th, with Sri Lanka's Power and Energy Minister Pavitra Wanniarachchi, adding the increased Chinese role will ensure there will not be “any future technical failures.”

Jellyfish reportedly clogged up filters at the trouble-plagued plant, with officials struggling to fix it before the Chinese President's visit. Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) Media Spokesman Senajith Dassanayake said,

“Around 30-40 divers have to be used to remove these creatures from the filters. We were hoping to remove these creatures from the filters of Unit 1, but unfortunately, seas these days are extremely rough in the area and the divers haven’t been able to go in thus far.”

“There are over one lakh (100,000) refugees in Tamil Nadu living in 115 camps. We have requested the Indian government to pressure the Sri Lankan government to release their [refugees’] land in the north which has been taken over by the Army.”

The Sri Lankan government announced the opening of two new detention centres to house foreign asylum seekers, after it faced criticism from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) for forcibly deporting refugees to Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Sri Lankan immigration officials announced the two new centres, in Boosa and Negombo, stating the present centre in Mirihana, Colombo was inadequate to deal with the growing number of Pakistani and Afghan nationals seeking refugee status.

Around 1,500 foreigners are thought to be seeking refuge in Sri Lanka, with a reported 60 Pakistanis being held in Boosa and a similar number of Afghan nationals in Negombo.

The United States has given $517,000 to support the construction of Poonakari hospital in the Kilinochchi district, as part of a program to support the Northern Provincial Council.

The hospital, which was opened on the 27th of August, is one of nine different hospitals that have received US$3.8 million in assistance from the U.S. Embassy and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).

The United National Party’s Colombo district MP Ravi Karunanayaka has threatened to cross over and join the government, if Hambantota district MP Sajith Premadasa is appointed as the deputy leader of the party.

ColomboPage reported Karunanayaka as opposing Premadasa’s proposed appointment to the post, which has caused internal disputes within the opposition party.

Karunanayaka reportedly voiced his warning to UNP leader Ranil Wickremasinghe, who is looking to rebuild the UNP, amid earlier defections from their members to the governing party. 

The Sri Lankan government announced that rice millers who hide stock face ‘stern action’ as it set a deadline for all vendors to submit details of their stock.

Private mills and stores will be raided after the September 15th deadline to search for hidden stocks, with the government warning those traders who they claim are trying to inflate rice prices.

The government earlier set prices for rice, with the Consumer Affairs Authority having so far raided 400 vendors who had sold goods at higher than the set limit.

Meanwhile Sri Lanka is set to import some 100,000 tons of rice from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Vietnam, with Sri Lanka’s Finance Ministry forecasting that 15 per cent of the paddy harvest will be lost this year due to drought.