Addressing Sri Lankan President, Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s first parliamentary address since the parliamentary elections, the Hindu urged the government to “not undo democratic gains or roll back devolution in the Constitution”.

The residents of Mathagal, Jaffna protested and expressed strong objection against Sri Lankan land surveyors' attempts to legalise the navy occupation of a privately owned strip of land, last week.

Sri Lankan army commander and accused war criminal, Shavendra Silva, has been appointed to the National Sports Council by Sports Minister Namal Rajapaksa. 

Tamil National People's Front (TNPF) leader, Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam, gave a powerful speech in which he insisted that Tamil rights and the Tamil nation must be recognised; as well as arguing that “sovereignty can never be a defence in the face of serious accusations of war crimes”. 

This remark came during parliamentary debates on the government’s policy statement presented by Sri Lankan President and accused war criminal Gotabaya Rajapaksa. 

Eight motor cell explosives were found buried in the ground in Vavuniya and recovered by Sri Lankan Special Task Force (STF) officials, yesterday. 

^{Photograph:  Facebook - MP Manusha Nanayakkara}

Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) parliamentarian, Manusha Nanayakkara, demanded Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena to retract parts of The leader of the Thamizh Makkal Thesiya Kootani (TMTK) and parliamentarian C.V. Wigneswaran’s speech, yesterday. 

The leader of the Thamizh Makkal Thesiya Kootani (TMTK) and former Chief Minister of the Northern Province, C. V. Wigneswaran urged the Sri Lankan government to “shed the false historical perspectives of the past” and insisted that the rights of the people in the North-East needs to be recognised as they “are entitled to the right of self-determination”.

Wigneswaran also stated that “we have a very powerful government now” and that there was “a similar government during the regime… [of] the 1983 Pogrom,” during his first parliamentary speech last week.

People for Equality and Relief in Sri Lanka (PEARL) expressed “grave concerns” about the results of the Sri Lanka’s parliamentary election in fortifying Sri Lanka Prime Minister, Mahinda Rajapaksa and Sri Lanka President, Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s “increasingly autocratic and ethnocratic regime”.

Sri Lanka’s newly appointed cabinet ministers are to appoint a five-member committee to effectively repeal the 19^th amendment, which limits the powers of the presidency, and replace it with a proposed 20^th amendment.

In the recent Sri Lankan Parliamentary election “Rajapaksa appealed to Sinhalese chauvinism, boasting of his role in crushing the Tamil Independence movement” Chris Slee wrote for the Green Left.

The Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka (HRCSL) has received complaints claiming that Sri Lankan police and Special Task Force (STF) officers assaulted people outside the Jaffna Central College, while parliamentary election votes were being recounted on Friday 7^th August.