Tamil families of the disappeared in Vavuniya marked their 1900th day of continuous roadside protest yesterday, in pursuit of answers to the whereabouts of their loved ones.

A summit that pulls together Tamils from across the globe has kicked off in London this morning, with professionals and academics from over 70 countries set to attend the three-day conference.

The summit, being held in South London, will bring together hundreds of Tamils with an aim “to imagine and to engineer collective trust, friendship, co-creations and shared prosperity”.

"When Tamils come together to synergize, we can envision and visualize larger and bigger initiatives,” said Father Jegath Gasper Raj.

The General Secretary of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) has called for Sri Lankan police to open an investigation after a statute of SWRD Bandaranaike was temporarily blindfolded by protestors last week, claiming a Tamil Guardian article had inspired the move.

Tamil families of the disappeared are not protesting because of Sri Lanka’s economic collapse, but to find the whereabouts of their missing loved ones said the head of the association for enforced disappeared persons in Vavuniya in remarks to reporters last week.

Sarojini Shanmugampillai told journalists that the Tamil families “are not protesting because of the shortage of food, water, fuel or match boxes”.

In 2008, Thangarasa Selvarani’s son Thangarasa Thayaparan, then aged 28, was taken by the Sri Lankan army in front of her eyes.

It was 7 days after the birth of his child. He was sleeping outside their home in Cheddikulam, Vavuniya, after a day of wage labour, loading sand into trucks.

Selvarani told him to sleep inside, it was dark and the barking of the street dogs was out of character.

He said it was too hot, and he wanted to sleep outside.

At around 9pm, Selvarani heard a cry and went outside to see that around 30 or 40 soldiers had rounded the house and were carrying her son off.

Sri Lanka's Finance minister has announced his intent to increase the country's sales tax, after conceding the government made a mistake when It almost halved the rate of value-added tax to 8% in 2019.

Ali Sabry, who is also the acting justice minister, told the BBC in a recent interview that he has no notice but to raise the country's sales tax in order to try and bridge the gap between revenue and expenditure.

"We have to increase the taxes. We need to find a way to bridge the revenue gap and expenditure which we have," he said.

Batticaloa journalists marked World Press Freedom Day with a vigil to pay tribute to the media workers that have been killed in Sri Lanka.

The journalists lit candles and laid flowers in tribute to their murdered colleagues. 

Protestors at Colombo’s Galle Face Green called for justice for famed Tamil newsreader Isaipriya, who was executed by the Sri Lankan army in 2009.

Yesterday marked her 40^th birthday.

As part of the continuous protest in Sri Lanka’s capital, demonstrators held a photograph of Isaipriya alongside other media workers, in a call for accountability and justice. "Rajapaksas - their blood is on your hands," read the banner.

The Sri Lankan army claimed the US ambassador praised the military “for their contribution to the sustenance of peace in the peninsula” whilst on a visit to the occupied city of Jaffna last week.

According to a report on the official army website, the military said US Ambassador Julie Chung praised the security forces during a meeting with the head of the military in Jaffna Major General Sujeewa Senarath Yapa.

The Tamil Nadu Assembly showed unanimous support to pass a resolution that would urge the Union government to send aid to Sri Lanka in order to combat the ongoing economic crisis last week.

Chief Minister MK Stalin introduced the resolution into the house, addressing the assembly Stalin said “Tamil Nadu would like to help by sending 40,000 tonnes of rice, 137 types of life-saving drugs, and 500 tonnes of milk powder.” Stalin adds that “We can’t see the development in Sri Lanka as the neighboring country’s internal issue.”