India’s central government has consistently rejected the Tamil Nadu government’s proposition to release seven people who have been convicted over the killing of Rajiv Gandhi to avoid “international ramifications”, it was revealed this week.

Sri Lankan government minister Mahindananda Aluthgamage told parliament he had obtained evidence that former prime minister Ranil Wickremesinghe had conspired to assassinate him.

Aluthgamage, Sri Lanka's State Minister of Power, said that following the arrest of UNP parliamentarian Ranjan Ramanayake, evidence had been retrieved that contained telephone conversations between Ramanayaka and Wickremesinghe with details of an assassination plan.

He spoke about the supposed leaked phone conversation and said “Ranjan Ramanayake is clearly seeking the blessings of former Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe to assassinate me”. 

Former Sri Lankan Deputy Minister Sarana Gunawardena was sentenced to three years in jail today for "misusing public funds”, during his term under the previous Rajapaksa government from 2005 to 2007.

Colombo Chief Magistrate Lanka Jayaratne sentenced Gunawardena to three years in jail and fined him Rs.300,000 for the misappropriation of state funds, related to his time as chairman of the Development Lotteries Board (DLB)

Sajith Premadasa, leader of opposition United National Party (UNP), has stated his party will now have a new “vision and outlook” as he pledged to “give the top most priority to the security of the Sinhala Buddhist motherland”.

Colombo Page reports Premadasa as telling an audience in Galle that for his party “clearly the number one priority of the Opposition is to ensure the security of the nation”, as it prepares for parliamentary elections later this year.

A 73-year-old Tamil man who had spent over a decade searching for his forcibly disappeared son, has passed away in Mannar last week.

Soosaipillai Rajenthiram, from the Olaithoduvai region, had been struggling with his health for several years, but nevertheless persisted in demanding the Sri Lankan government release more information on the whereabouts of his son Antony Ranjan.

Locals in Mannar commemorated the 35th anniversary of the Vankalai church massacre this week, where Sri Lankan soldiers shot dead a Christian father and other Tamils.

The Sri Lankan government has announced it will “review” the Office of Missing Persons (OMP) Act, which was brought in by the previous regime as part of its commitments to a UN Human Rights Council resolution on accountability.

An official attached to Sri Lanka’s Justice Ministry told the Daily Mirror that the government had held a preliminary discussion on the act, though added: “it is too early to say whether it would be repealed or not”. 

“We have to review it properly and then decide,” he said.