At least seven people, hailing from the North-East were arrested at the Bandaranaike Airport near Colombo over the last two weeks, according to Thinakkural.

A group of six people, who were exiled in Italy, were assaulted by the Terrorism Investigation Department (TID) at the airport, with one 31 year old man from Puttur, Northern Province hospitalised. The others were arrested and had charges filed against them by a court in Negombo and are being held on remand.

The British Deputy High Commissioner to Sri Lanka Laura Davies, described in a blog post her recent trip to the Vanni, highlighting that army welfare shops were everywhere, with private businesses "not easy to find".

"Unlike in the rest of Sri Lanka, it is impossible to ignore how recent the end of the conflict was and how raw some of the scars remain," she said, adding that there were "a lot of [Sri Lankan] military memorials".

"The need to grieve and to know what happened to missing loved ones remains overwhelming. I met ex-combatants who were socially and economically excluded. Promised releases of political prisoners are slower than people would like," she said.

The Sri Lankan navy will “assist in the conducting” of the annual St Anthony’s Church festival in the North of the island, reported the Ministry of Defence.

The annual St Anthony’s Church feast is scheduled to be held in Kachchatheevu on 29 Feb.

Sri Lanka’s Ministry of Defence said that under the “the direction of the Defence Ministry and supervision of Navy Commander Vice Admiral Jayantha Perera” the navy would be assisting in the festivities.

The festival draws thousands of people from across the North-East of the island and India.

The military's ongoing involvement in Tamil affairs almost 6 years after the end of the armed conflict has been widely condemned with numerous calls for the new president, Maithripala Sirisena to demilitarise the North-East.

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The Tamil National Alliance spokesperson Suresh Premachandra said over 700 people are being held at a secret army camp, established by Gotabaya Rajapaksa in the North-Eastern town of Trincomalee, Colombo Mirror reported.

“Over 20,000 have been forced to disappear during and after the war amid reports that many of them are held in various secret camps elsewhere in the country. We have reliable information that over 700 people have been detained without any outside links at the secret Gota’s camp in Trincomalee,” the MP told parliament on Thursday.

“We urge Minister of Law and Order, John Amaratunga to investigate into this reports and reveal the identity of those who are held at this secret camp,” he said.

The US Tamil Political Action Council has urged the international community to judge Sri Lanka’s new government by its actions and not by its words.

In a statement released on Friday, USTPAC said the dismay caused by the deferral of the report has been tempered by Human Rights High Commissioner Zeid’s commitment to a stronger outcome.

"USTPAC appreciates High Commissioner Zeid's "absolute and unshakable commitment" to the OISL report's publication in September," said Dr. Karunyan Arulanantham, President of USTPAC. "We also take note of the Government of Sri Lanka's stated commitments, made in conjunction with the announcement of the delayed release, and urge the international community to vigilantly ensure that these commitments are fully honored and translated into measurable metrics."

The Sri Lankan government is engaged in talks with Pakistan to explore cooperation on nuclear energy, according to Power Minister Champika Ranawaka.

Sri Lanka is said to have readied a memorandum of understanding to be signed with Pakistan to improve “technical capacities and human capacities.”

“We have already signed an agreement with Russian state-owned ROSATOM,” he told reporters on Thursday, adding that the government is also exploring possible collaboration with France and the United States.