The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) has released its annual human rights report and has listed Sri Lanka as a country of concern, along with countries such as North Korea, Iran, Russia and Syria.

Sri Lanka imports 90% of its oil from Iran, and with US-EU sanctions on Iran looming, needs to source oil elsewhere.

But its sole refinery, at Sapugaskanda, needs upgrading if it is to refine oil from other countries.

Seven years have passed since the Tamil journalist and editor of TamilNet was found assassinated in Colombo, inside a High Security Zone.

No-one has yet been brought to justice for his murder, after a trial was postponed earlier this year.

The Dambulla dispute maybe resolved by intervention from the president, reports The Sunday Times.

The Sri Lankan army has been collecting information on young Tamil men and women who it claims are former LTTE cadres, reports Tamilwin.

Upto 500 young men and women, including 200 in Trincomalee have been targeted. All in the name of 'rehabilitation'.

See also:

Muslims in Ampara and Batticaloa districts demonstrated for a second day through strike action, over the desecration of a mosque in Dambulla.

According to reports in the BBC, demonstrations were halted by the Sri Lankan military.

Despite the United Nations having released more evidence of cluster bomb use in Sri Lanka, the Sri Lankan Army has continued to deny their use.

Noting that it was “not the first time such allegations have been hurled at us”, Brigadier Wanigasooriya said,

The Ministry of Defence and Urban Development declared the month of May (specifically, 30th April to 30th May) as the 'Ranaviru Month' (War Heroes Commemoration Month) for the Sri Lankan armed forces and police force.

A petition has been filed in the Supreme Court against a number of political parties that use the word “Tamil” in their names, claiming that it violates the Constitution of Sri Lanka.

Following a UN demining expert’s discovery this week of unexploded cluster munitions used by Sri Lankan forces during the island’s war, a medical worker has told Associated Press of seeing civil

British High Commissioner John Rankin, speaking at the recently held Sri Lanka Apparel Sourcing Association AGM, said:

The Urban Development Authority ordered that recent development work at a 60-year-old Pillaiyar temple in Trincomalee be demolished, citing the need for "road development work".

The Urban Development Authority is under the Ministry of Defence, overseen by the President’s brother Gothbaya Rajapakse.

See

Minority Rights Groups International said in a statement it was very concerned about the recent attack on a mosque in Sri Lanka by a Singhalese mob.