The Sri Lankan Army continued with its series of trips to the Palaly military base for Tamil preschool children, despite criticism about intensifying militarisation of Tamil schools and preschools.

A total of 32,855 acres of land in Mannar is occupied by either security forces or government agencies, according to statistics published by the Mannar District Secretariat.

Publishing in response to a Right to Information (RTI) request, the secretariat said 2,271 acres of state land and 312 acres of private land was occupied by the Sri Lankan army and navy.

13,890 acres of state land and 2,920 acres of private land was occupied by the forest department; 10,304 acres of state land and 3,145 acres of private land by the department of wildlife; and 11 acres of state land and 2 acres of private land occupied by the archaeology department.

A senior Sri Lankan navy officer has been arrested and charged with the murder of two Tamil businessmen, after they were abducted by the military in January 2009.

The two Tamils were reportedly kidnapped by the navy and taken to the Welisara navy camp, a police official told AFP. They were abducted allegedly under the pretext that the vehicle they were travelling in was carrying an explosive.

"Later, they dismantled the vehicle and sold the parts after having killed the two men," said the official.

Their murder took place despite the families of the Tamils paying the military a ransom for their release.

Chief Minister of the Northern Province C V Wigneswaran criticised the Sri Lanakn government and Tamil National Alliance for failing to deliver on promises made to the Tamil people, in his final address to the Northern Provincial Council this week.

Shortly before he announced the formation of a new political part, the retired Supreme Court judge said that the Sri Lankan government had failed to uphold its pledge to devolve power to the North-East.

Sri Lanka’s Special Task Force (STF) troops arrested four Tamil youths in Jaffna on Monday.

Three of the youths from Kokkuvil and Mallakam were accused of smoking cannabis.

The STF said that the fourth, arrested separately, was involved in a recent sword attack at Uppumada Junction in Kondavil.

All four were handed over to Jaffna police.

The Hindu has hit back at the Sri Lankan president’s denial of reports that he told cabinet ministers that Indian intelligence services were involved in a plot to assassinate him, stating that their report had been cross-verified.

The Hindu’s Readers’ Editor said their reporter in Colombo had “directly cross-verified the information with two Ministers who were present at the Cabinet meeting in which the President made this incredible statement”.

“She got indirect confirmations from two others,” he add.

As the tenure of the current Northern Provincial Council came to an end this week, two prominent members, including the Chief Minister inaugurated new political parties, breaking away from the Ilankai Tamil Arasu Katchi (ITAK)/Tamil National Alliance (TNA).

Tamils in the North-East have protested this week in solidarity with estate workers calling for a rise in their minimum wage.

Sri Lanka’s finance minister Mangala Samaraweera admitted that harsh times lay ahead for the island’s economic situation as the rupee continued its freefall this week.

Despite various measures taken, the rupee has lost more than 12 percent of its value this year alone, hitting a record-low 174.12 rupees to the dollar. With sanctions on Iran, one of Sri Lanka’s primary sources for crude oil, set to hit later this year, Samaraweera admitted the outlook was bleak.

"The rise of the dollar is having a serious impact on our currencies,” he added. “We are not the only one affected."

A Sri Lankan court has granted authorities permission to ask Chinese phone manufacturer Huawei to recover data from a mobile phone, allegedly used as part of a reported “assassination plot” against Sri Lanka’s current president Maithripala Sirisena and former defence secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa.

Sri Lanka’s Criminal Investigation Department said that they needed the Chinese manufacturer’s assistance in recovering data that had been deleted from the mobile phone of a police informant.