Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse has congratulated Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas on his country’s successful bid to become a non-member observer state at the United Nations.

Rajapakse wrote in a letter that the people of Sri Lanka have “steadfastly stood with the Palestinian people in their decades long struggle for justice”.

“It is with great pleasure that I extend my heartiest congratulations and sincere best wishes to Your Excellency and the people of Palestine on behalf of the government and people of Sri Lanka on this happy occasion of the adoption of the historic resolution on the enhancement of the status of Palestine in the United Nations General Assembly,” said the letter.

A group of 56 asylum seekers who were due to be deported from Australia have applied for an injunction halting their deportation, stating the Australian government has ignored pleas that they face persecution upon their return.

Whilst the injunction has not been granted, the asylum seekers will see their case return to court on Thursday. 

Ian Rintoul, a campaigner with the Refugee Action Coalition slammed the Australian screening process for asylum seekers as  "entirely unaccountable, non-transparent, non reviewable", stating,

"We don't know the criteria on which these decisions are made; but they are clearly life and death decisions,"

Wimal Weerawansa has said at a public meeting in Amparai that the West was behind political instability on the island.

He said that the US had caused rifts between the judiciary and the parliament in Pakistan, and is now doing the same in Sri Lanka, reported The Island.

Weerawansa also added that those subverting the country were taking orders from Washington and London.

Thirty-seven Tamil Nadu fishermen were arrested by the Sri Lankan Navy off the eastern coast of Pulmoddai at 5am, reports the PTI.

The navy spokesperson Kosala Warnakulasuriya, who announced the arrest, said the fishermen were to be brought to Trincomalee where there would be handed over to the police.

The Jaffna University adminstration is believed to have been given the list of at least ten students that are wanted by the Sri Lankan security forces, reports JDS, adding to fears of further arrests.

Speaking to JDS, a source from Jaffna said,

The High Commissioner of India, Ashok K. Kantha, donated over 175 fishing boats fishing equipment to over 350 IDPs on Sunday, during a visit to Mannar.

Addressing those present, Kantha said that India was also working towards building up a fishnet factory in Gurunagar, Jaffna, through the supply of 152 million rupees worth of equipment.

The Sri Lankan government has announced that they are considering purchasing crude oil from Iraq, after US-imposed sanctions on Iran, the island’s main supplier of crude oil.

The announcement follows the US Senate passing another wave of sanctions aimed at Iran’s energy sector. The country was estimated to have provided up to 92% of Sri Lanka’s crude oil prior to the sanctions being put in place.

The head of the Jaffna Security Forces, Major General Mahinda Hathurusinghe, dismissed the widespread news at the Sri Lankan military, along with the police, were responsible for attacks at Jaffna university over Maaveerar Naal commemoration events, and on the editor of the Tamil newspaper, the Uthayan.

Accusing Uthayan of attempting to discredit the military, Major General Hathurusinghe said:

Four students from Jaffna University have been transferred to Colombo after being arrested by the Sri Lankan Terrorist Investigation Department (TID) on Friday.

The arrested students are:

Paralingam Tharshananth (Secretary of the Jaffna Students Union)

Ganesamurthy Sudarsan (Medical Faculty Student)

Kangasundaraswamy Janamejeyanth (Arts Union President)

Sanmugam Solomon (Final year Science Faculty Student)