More than 600 Sinhala fishermen have now settled in 9 different coastal areas across Mullativiu said Northern Provincial Council member T Ravikaran, as he outlined details of state-sponsored colonisation of the Tamil North-East.

Mr Ravikaran also stated that at least 9 Buddhist viharas had been constructed in the Mullaitivu district in the last 6 years alone, all of which have been aided by the Sri Lankan armed forces.

The councillor detailed the long history of state-sponsored colonisation, recalling that in 1981 12 to 14 fishermen had been granted temporary permits to settle in Kokkilai and fish. Now the number in that village alone is 300.

The Chief Minister of the Northern Province Justice C V Wigneswaran was set to meet Sri Lanka's president and prime minister in Colombo today, in order to discuss the ongoing issue of military occupation of civilians lands in the Tamil North-East.

However, the meeting was postponed after the chief minister was hospitalised with a sudden illness, reports the Daily Mirror. There is no further information on his condition at the time of reporting.

A high level delegation of Sri Lankan officials is in Washington DC to negotiate with the IMF about an economic programme to help ease its balance of payment crisis.

Finance minister Ravi Karunanayake and Central Bank governor Arjuna Mahendran are attending the IMF and World Bank spring meetings in the US capital.

A study by Sri Lanka's Sunday Times has found that low and middle income households will be worst hit by the government’s move to raise Value Added Tax (VAT) to 15 percent from May 2.

Telephone, water and electricity bills are due to rise, on top of an increase on consumer items, medical bills and private education.

The budget 2016 had proposed a two-band VAT rate – 8 and 12.5 percent instead of a single rate of 11 percent, which however, not implemented.

Sri Lanka's president and prime minister are to head a series of high level security meetings in which new security measures are to be laid out, reports The Sunday Leader.

Sri Lanka's Intelligence Unit has been preparing a report to president to government leaders at a series of round table meetings, in the wake of remarks made by the Joint Opposition.

Opposition parliamentarians had raised concerns over security in the Tamil North-East after the reported discovery of explosives and weapons in Jaffna and Mannar earlier this month.

A Tamil man who was abducted by a white van from his home in Jaffna last week, has been found in Sri Lanka's notorious Criminal Investigation Department (CID) headquarters in Colombo, reports Ceylon News.

Rajadurai Jeyanthan was abducted by armed men claiming to be from Sri Lanka’s Terrorism Investigation Division in a white van last Sunday. His mother, who has since been desperately searching for his whereabouts was initially told he had been taken to Boosa Detention Camp in the Sinhala south of the island.

However Mr Jeyanthan's wife Menaka Jeyanthan told Ceylon News on Sunday that they had finally located him.

“Although we were told earlier that he had been sent to the Boosa detention camp, we visited him this morning (April 17) at the 4th Floor of the CID in Colombo,” she said.

The fourth floor of the CID headquarters in Colombo is infamous for torturing detainees. See one account from 2012 here.

An official at the Jaffna HRC had earlier told Ceylon News that abductions have continued in the North-East, with Rajadurai Jeyanthan's case being the third complaint they have received in April alone.

The Sri Lankan government says it will analyse the latest US State Department country report on human rights.

Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Harsha de Silva said the government will express its views on the report, which details violations which occurred in 2015.