<p>Sri Lankan Prime Minister, Ranil Wickremesinghe, has introduced a bill to abolish the death penalty in the lead up to the execution of four drug convicts.</p> <p>The proposed bill would abolish the death sentence in the future and commute the sentences of those already on death row to life imprisonment. The bill was introduced to parliament on Thursday and will take a vote in 14 days if no one challenges it will pass.</p>

Human Rights Watch reports that Sri Lankan authorities have continued to fail to hold accountable the responsible for the ACF massacre, where 17 aid workers were summarily executed by Sri Lankan troops in Muttur in 2006.

Human Rights Watch, Legal and Policy Director, James Ross reports that the continued failure to deliver justice for the victims of this massacre shows “the need for the government to seek international judicial assistance to prosecute these and other killings”.

The United National Party has pledged jobs to unemployed graduates in Jaffna if they voted for the party in upcoming elections, reports Sri Lanka’s Sunday Times. 

Sri Lanka’s State Minister for Education Vijayakala Maheswaran has reportedly been registering details of unemployed graduates and others who are seeking government jobs at her office at Palaly Road.

“Those who registered said they were assured by the State Minister that if the UNP returned to power, they will be given appointments immediately,” said the Sunday Times. “All they had to do was to vote for her party.”

Sinhala speaking men dressed in civil uniform photographed Tamil lawyers who appeared at the Chavakachcheri Magistrate Court earlier today, in an apparent act of intimidation as the Navatkuli Disappearances habeas corpus inquiry was underway.

One of the men was then seen getting into a car belonging to the Deputy Solicitor General representing the Sri Lankan army, said Senior Lecturer & Head of Jaffna University’s Department of Law, Kumaravadivel Guruparan on Twitter.

Buddhist monks in Trincomalee led prayers at the Kanniya hot wells, with hundreds of Sinhalese followers attempting to crowd out Tamil devotees who were commemorating an important fast day at the spring’s Hindu temple.

Sri Lanka's Parliament passed an extension of the state of emergency for the third time since the Easter Sunday attacks by Islamist extremists, who targeted churches and luxury hotels.

The bill received 42 votes in favour, whilst 2 Tamil National Alliance (TNA) MPs voted against the extension. 

On July 22, President Maithripala Sirisena issued an extraordinary gazette extending the state of emergency.

<p>As Sri Lanka’s tourism crisis continues, Colombo announced that they will offer free tourism visas on arrival, in a move to boost tourist numbers following the Easter Sunday bombings.</p> <p>Visa-free entry will be available to 48 nations and the offer will remain for six months.</p> <p>On April 21, Islamist extremists targeted three luxury hotels in Colombo and three churches in Batticaloa, Negombo and Colombo, killing over 250 people.</p> <p>Following the attacks, several countries then issued travel advisories, undermining Sri Lanka’s tourism industry. Foreign visitor arrivals fell by 70.8 per cent in May.&nbsp;</p>

Without a political solution to Sri Lanka’s enduring ethnic crisis and a new constitution for the island “the future of this country will be worse than anything we have ever seen,” warned senior Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarian M A Sumanthiran.

The leader of the All Ceylon Makkal Congress (ACMC) Party Rishad Bathiudeen said that Sri Lanka’s Muslim politicians had canvassed support for Sri Lanka at the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva, where Colombo was attempting to fend off investigations into mass atrocities committed by the military against Tamils during the final phase of the armed conflict.

Sri Lankan cricketer Lasith Malinga paid tribute to former president and accused war criminal Mahinda Rajapaksa in a farewell speech last week, after he announced his retirement from One Day International cricket.

“I was able to play cricket longer than expected only because of President Mahinda Rajapaksa,” Malinga told the crowd at the Ranasinghe Premadasa Stadium in Colombo. “I am forever grateful for his help.”