US President Joe Biden announced that Samantha Power, the former ambassador to the United Nations who has visited Sri Lanka on at least three occasions, will be his pick to lead the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) in a bid to confront “climate change, global poverty and democratic backsliding”.

Under the Obama administration, she served as a White House national security staffer from 2009 to 2013, before going on to become the US ambassador to the UN until 2017.

During her tenure, however, she came under both praise and criticism, particularly for the way in which the administration handled Sri Lanka.

Sri Lanka's Presidential Commission on "Political Victimisation" has called for the pardoning of 25 former military officers, including those involved in the notorious Trinco 11 case, as well as a number of high profile human rights abuses.

The Commission reportedly further calls for the release of all military personnel and is allegedly being used to exonerate and acquit war criminals and money launders, and punish respondents.

For the fourth day, demonstrators continued their march for justice from Pottuvil to Polikandy (P2P), commencing their protests at the Vavuniya new bus stand and heading towards Mannar, on Saturday morning.  

The Central Bank of Sri Lanka has announced that it has repaid a $400 million currency swap facility from the Reserve Bank of India.

This comes after India reportedly refused to extend the currency exchange which expired on 1 February 2021, stating it would not be possible without Sri Lanka negotiating a staff-level agreement for an IMF programme.

Following escalating tensions between Sri Lankan and India, Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa has claimed that “India is our closest friend” and that “we can resolve any dispute with them” but has not provided any further updates on the East Container Terminal (ECT) project.

A joint press release published by the International Truth and Justice Project (ITJP) and Journalists for Democracy Sri Lanka (JDS) reports a staggering number of retired and serving military officers being appointed to key administrative posts by President and former army officer Gotabaya Rajapaksa.

Last week marked the 15th year since seven workers of the Tamils Rehabilitation Organization (TRO) were kidnapped, tortured, and murdered by Sri Lankan government-backed paramilitaries in Batticaloa.

The paramilitary Karuna group was allegedly responsible for the attack.

Several Sri Lankan web domains, including google.lk are currently experiencing a DNS cache spoofing attack, in which web traffic to the site is being redirected to a site which highlights corruption within the government, the lack of media freedom, the plight of tea plantation workers, the issue of forced cremations and the ongoing genocide of Tamils on the island.

 The Telecommunications Regulatory Commission (TRC) tweeted that “certain .lk currently being affected by a malicious redirection”.

Jaffna police have arrested a participant of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) 'Independence Day' rally over suspected involvement in sword attacking incidents. 

The police had reportedly received intelligence that two people allegedly involved in sword attacking incidents in the city were participating in the SLFP march. 

When the police arrived at the spot to apprehend the suspected individuals, one of them had reportedly fled the scene while the other was arrested. 

For the third day, Tamils and Muslims continued their march for justice from Pottuvil to Polikandy (P2P), commencing with a special prayer at the Trincomalee Shiva Temple on Friday morning.