The world's largest refiner, China's Sinopec plans to start work on a refinery in Sri Lanka by June, the power minister said last Thursday.

Officials of Sinopec Overseas Investment Holding were visiting Colombo for talks with Sri Lankan authorities.

"The officials indicated that the management of Sinopec has decided to double the capacity of the refinery from the original proposal," the minister, Kanchana Wijesekera, wrote on social media platform X.

State Minister of Social Empowerment, Anupa Pasqual says president Ranil Wickremesinghe should consider a presidential pardon for Gnanasara, a convicted racist Buddhist monk, following his recent sentencing. 

Sri Lanka’s former president Maithripala Sirisena claimed that India was behind the deadly Easter Sunday attacks that saw hundreds killed as churches and hotels were bombed in 2019.

According to a report in the Sunday Times, Sirisena told Sri Lanka’s Criminal Investigation Department (CID) that an Indian diplomat admitted Delhi’s involvement behind the bombings.

Residents in Kalmunai staged a protest calling for justice to be meted out to the victims and survivors of the terror attacks on Easter Sunday. They also called for an investigation to be carried out without further delay. 

Tamils protested outside the Tissa Raja Vihara in Thaiyiddy, Jaffna, which was illegally constructed and is encroaching on the lands owned by local residents. 

Residents were joined by the Tamil National People’s Front (TNPF) yesterday as they demanded the return of the 100 parappu of land owned by 14 Tamil families that surrounds the vihara.

A group of three Tamils who were released after spending three decades in prison over the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi were finally reunited with their families, but faced further questioning from the Sri Lankan police on their arrival back on the island.

Security was tightened last week in Keppapulavu over planned protests by residents who have been demanding the release of their lands currently occupied by the Sri Lankan military.

Several police officers were seen deployed in the morning and speaking to residents who had gathered in front of the occupying Security Forces Headquarters in Mullaitivu. 

Tamil residents of Kalmunai North held protests last week opposing a move by the Sri Lankan government to subjugate their division under the Kalmunai South Division, adding that Tamils in the region have been longing for a separate divisional secretary 40 years ago and were assured a fully-fledged secretariat to address their community-specific needs. 

Last week, India’s most senior political figures sparked off a row that continues to rage. Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Foreign Minister S Jaishankar expressed their outrage at the 1974 decision by Congress to cede the Katchatheevu islet to Sri Lanka after a set of new documents were publicly unveiled. The small island midway across the Palk Strait remains uninhabited but carries significant political weight, with Indian political parties in Tamil Nadu and beyond seeking to distance themselves from the decision to grant the territory to Colombo. Though the row is domestic for now, it scratches at a deeper issue that remains emotive and crucially important for millions of Tamils – the safety of Tamil Nadu fishermen.

Six of the eight Tamils who were arrested at Vedukkunaari Hill temple in Vavuniya last month, filed a complaint at Sri Lanka's Human Rights Commission (HRC)  in Colombo after the local office in Vavuniya failed to take action over the case.