Scottish independence is “within reach”, First Minister John Swinney has said, as a new poll projects the Scottish National Party just one seat short of a majority ahead of this year’s Holyrood election.

A United Nations fact-finding mission has determined that atrocities carried out during the siege and takeover of the Sudanese city of El Fasher bear the “hallmarks of genocide”, condemning the conduct of paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) fighters in Darfur during the ongoing conflict.

The 32nd anniversary of the killing of Tamil fishermen by the Sri Lankan Navy was commemorated on Wednesday at St Mary’s Grounds in Kaddaikadu, where relatives and locals gathered in remembrance.

Two civil society organisations operating in the North-East have been summoned by Sri Lanka’s Terrorism Investigation Division (TID), in what activists warn is the latest move in an escalating pattern of surveillance and intimidation targeting Tamil civic space.

An Up-Country People’s Front parliamentarian has drawn attention to the period of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) control in the North-East as he backed tougher legal measures to tackle the island’s illicit drug crisis.

A protest was held in Point Pedro on Saturday, marking nineteen years since the enforced disappearance of Tamil journalist and teacher Subramaniam Ramachandran, who was arrested by Sri Lankan military personnel and has not been seen since.

Some 500 Sinhala Buddhist monks gathered in Colombo on 20 February 2026 for a “Maha Sangha Convention” at the headquarters of the All Ceylon Buddhist Congress (ACBC), adopting a ten-point declaration that reasserts the primacy of Buddhism within the Sri Lankan state.

The wife of a Tamil man arrested in Jaffna has accused Sri Lankan police of torturing her husband in custody and subsequently charging him in a drug case, in what she says is an attempt to cover up abuse.

The commander of the United States Pacific Fleet, Admiral Steve ‘Web’ Koehler, arrived in Sri Lanka last week for a three-day visit, as Washington moves to deepen security cooperation with Colombo despite longstanding concerns over human rights abuses and militarisation in the Tamil homeland.