Former president Mahinda Rajapaksa and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe should work together and cooperate, Bodu Bala Sena General Secretary Galagodaaththe Gnanasara, who is also the head of the new party Bodu Jana Peramuna (BJP), said on Tuesday.

Mr Rajapaksa and Mr Wickremesinghe should not treat each other as enemies when contesting, the monk said, requesting former president Chadrika Kumaratunga not to treat Mr Rajapaksa with enmity, the DailyMirror said.

He further said Sarath Fonseka, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, Udaya Gammanpila, Champika Ranawake, Wimal Weerawansa and the JVP should forget their political differences and treat each other with respect and honour.

“We should consider these people as Sri Lankans and should work under a national policy for at least two years. Party leaders should cooperate with each other because if not it will be catestrophic for Sri Lanka,” Mr Gnanasara said.

The UPFA says it will win the election without difficulty as the 6.2 million people who voted for President Maithripala Sirisena would not vote for the new alliance, the UNFGG, while the 5.8 million who voted for Mahinda Rajapaksa would continue to vote for him.

General Secretary of the party, Susil Premajayanthe said 600,000 Tamil votes and 700,000 JVP votes must be deducted from the votes received by Mr Sirisena in January, as the electorate would vote for the parties themselves.

"It means 1.3 million deducted from the 6.2 million the UNFGG is hoping to obtain," he said at a press conference.

“We have won 10 out of 22 districts at the January 8 presidential election. We lost three districts -- Badulla, Gampaha and Puttalam in a close fight and there is no doubt that we can regain those easily at the election. Then Polonnaruwa district is an absolute win for the UPFA making it 14 out 22 districts for the UPFA. Then we will get 14 bonus seats also from the 14 districts we will win,

Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesighe and former president Mahinda Rajapaksa both visited the Temple of the Tooth on Tuesday, to get blessings ahead of the general elections in a month’s time.

Incumbent Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena vowed to defeat the former president Mahinda Rajapaksa in the upcoming Sri Lankan general elections

"I continue to stand against Mahinda Rajapaksa," said Mr Sirisena, adding that "he will be defeated again". The current president went on to state that he was against the nomination of Mr Rajapaksa under the ruling UPFA coalition. However former president Rajapaksa indicated he will be running for the post of prime minister with the UPFA, after having submitted his nomination papers, despite Mr Sirisena being the coalition leader.

The move has stirred unrest and criticism in the UPFA, with many high level defections and criticism of the president in recent weeks. Mr Sirisena responded by saying he applauded the criticism, which he said was only possible to his election victory earlier this year.

However he went on to warn that the freedom that he claimed to restore "should be enjoyed with a sense of responsibility".

The Tamil National People’s Front has filed its nomination for the Jaffna electoral district earlier today.
The party, which will contest under the All Ceylon Tamil Congress’ bicycle symbol, is standing in all 5 electoral districts in the North-East.

The Sri Lankan military hosted an Indonesian government delegation this week and showcased the “success” it has had in rehabilitating former LTTE cadres.

The commander of Sri Lanka’s army met with the five member Indonesian delegation, as they listened to a lecture on the “rehabilitation” programme the Sri Lankan government has in place for former LTTE fighters.

A report last year detailed the programme of physical and psychological torture in Sri Lanka’s “rehabilitation” camps for former LTTE members.

Tamils Against Genocide (TAG) gathered evidence from former detainees, who detailed systematic torture, beatings, humiliation and sexual abuse in the camps, and concluded that rehabilitation in Sri Lanka is a “physical and mental pacification programme that forms a cornerstone of the Sinhala-Buddhist nationalist state-building project”.

Major General Hettiarachchi however told the Indonesian delegation that Sri Lanka was ”taking all necessary efforts in transforming the minds of those brainwashed combatants from violence to non-violence and enlightened them on the value of life and correct social commitments while living in harmony with all as law-abiding citizens of one country”.

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) and Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka (JDS) said they were “alarmed” at a move by Sri Lankan President Maithripala to revive the government’s much criticised Press Council.

Benjamin Ismaïl, the head of RSF’s Asia-Pacific desk, said,

“By reviving this mechanism for harassing the Sri Lankan media, President Sirisena is dashing the hopes raised by his election and is again placing the media under a permanent threat of authoritarian abuses”.

“We urge the president to rescind this decision and instead to begin a complete overhaul of the Press Council with the aim of turning it into an entity that guarantees media independence,” he added.

JDS also said, “the government’s move to re-enact the controversial legislation reinforces serious and legitimate fears, as the desire to curtail media freedom always reflects anti-democratic intentions”.

Sri Lanka’s former president Mahinda Rajapaksa will run for the post of prime minister at the upcoming general election on August 17 reports Reuters.

Allies of Rajapaksa told Reuters that the former president will stand for the post of prime minister whilst seeking to be elected in the island’s third largest electoral district, Kurungala.

Speaking on the phone to Reuters after handing over the nomination documents on Monday, Mahinda Rajapaksa, said,

“Today, people wants a change. I’m leading the campaign with President Sirisena as the chairman of the party to form a Sri Lanka Freedom Party-led government.”

The UNP and the UPFA have announced their final nominations for the general elections, to be held on August 17.

Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe will contest for the UNP led alliance from Colombo, alongside finance minister Rav Karunanayake, Harsha de Silva, Mano Ganeshan and the head of the JHU, a party led by Buddhist monks, Champika Ranawaka.

For President Maithripala Sirisena's UPFA, the capital will be contested by party heavyweights and Mahinda-loyalists, General Secretary Susil Premajayantha, chief whip in the last parliament, Dinesh Gunawardena and Wimal Weerawansa of the NFF.

Sri Lanka's Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe says the German car giant Volkswagen is planning to build a plant on the island.

The plant will purportedly placed in Kurunegala in the South, the prime minister said at a rally on Saturday.