Sri Lanka's Mass Media minister accuses newspapers of producing ‘fake news’

by Thusiyan
Aug 3, 2017

Sri Lanka’s Minister of Finance and Mass Media said media institutions on the island had a responsibility to report the truth, as he accused certain outlets of producing fake news.

ColomboPage reported Minister Mangala Samaraweera as stating “it is the responsibility of the media to impart truthful information to the public with self-regulation”.

“The Minister has added that certain social networking websites and some of the newspapers have become factories manufacturing false news,” ColomboPage reported.

His comments come after Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe raised the possibility of introducing regulation of social media sites last week.

Last month also saw Tamil journalists in Colombo and Jaffna have been harassed by Sri Lankan police officers and the military.

 

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