<p>Sri Lankan cabinet ministers approved a proposal to appoint a committee to investigate an ‘unauthorised’ mineral exploration project involving an Australian company on Mannar Island.</p>

As the Sri Lankan state continues to ramp up its militarisation of the North-East, an already marginalised community has now found itself under greater threat. The Tamil LGBTQ community, which has long faced its own intra-community discrimination and struggles for recognition has in recent months come under mounting pressure. A military enforced lockdown in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic and looming parliamentary elections has exacerbated existing inequalities.

Sri Lankan police officers arrested a Tamil youth in Vavuniya for alleged heroin possession, yesterday.  

The 23-year-old was arrested by Vanni police officers following and the narcotics control division who stated they were informed by the army of illegal drug trade operating in Kathar Sinnakulam, Vavuniya.

Rauff Hakeem, the Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SBW) candidate for the Kandy district and leader of the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress (SLMC) described the proportional representation system as advantageous to Muslims on the island at an election meeting in Gampola. 

Sri Lanka’s election commissioner (EC), Mahinda Deshapriya stated “only the police will be used for election duties” and insisted that the Sri Lankan military will only be used to “transport ballot boxes quickly from polling stations to election offices.”

Since Gotabaya Rajapaksa took office as President, he “has bent the democracy to its breaking point” as Sri Lanka slides further into military totalitarianism, writes Laxmanan Sanjeev for Foreign Policy.

A Tamil man has been seriously injured and hospitalised following a bomb attack in his home in Mannar last night.

Semalai Santhiyogu, a 59-year-old father-of-two, was admitted with serious injuries to Mannar Hospital, following the incident.

Jaffna University senior law lecturer, Dr Kumaravadivel Guruparan, has resigned "with utmost pain and sadness" after he was barred from private legal practice last year. 

In his resignation letter, Guruparan wrote that he felt "compelled to resign" after the Council of the University of Jaffna barred him from practising as a lawyer at the instigation of the Sri Lankan military. The move is seen as a direct reprisal for his representation of victims in the Navatkuli Habeas Corpus case, related to the disappearance of 24 Tamil youths from military custody in 1996.

The German Embassy in Colombo provided a grant of nearly Rs 4 million to a Sri Lankan NGO to support their project addressing Sexual and Gender Based Violence (SGBV) in Sri Lanka - which will benefit around 1500 women and children in areas such as Batticaloa and Jaffna.

Local Tamils in a village in Mullaitivu have been instructed by Sri Lankan officials to leave their land, despite having it returned to them from Sri Lankan military occupation. 

R Sampanthan, the current leader of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), announced that Indian President Narendra Modi is “standing behind us (TNA)” in a recent interview to Tamil media earlier this month. 

Sri Lanka has appointed a new navy commander, as promotions of officers close to Sri Lankan president and accused war criminal Gotabaya Rajapaksa continue.

A man has been arrested for allegedly being in possession of a sword and having connection to a string of sword violence related assaults dating back to last year.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi extolled the virtues of the classical Tamil literary and philosophical text Thirukkural in a tweet on Thursday.