News in brief

Japan jobs in false store

COLOMBO: Cinnamon Garden Police arrested woman at her residence in Summit Flat, Colombo for cheating a huge sum of money from people promising foreign employment in Japan, yesterday.

Damayanti Piyasoma had been engaged in the business fraudulently using Vocational and Technical Training Minister Piyasena Gamage's name, a ministry media release said.

The arrest was made while a woman from Ratnapura was offering a Rs.100,000 advance payment to Piyasoma to send her son to Japan through a broker. A receipt book, rubber stamps, and documents were also seized along with the broker.

Racket to send underaged girls as housemaids busted

K.P. Rajani, Ruwanwella group correspondent

RUWANWELLA: Girls aged between 14 and 15 taken to the Bandaranaike International Airport to be sent to the Middle East for employment as housemaids, were detected by the Foreign Employment Bureau (FEB).

The officials said the girls ages had been illegally changed.

The girls were detained at the FEB Welfare Centre. FEB Chairman, Prof. Jagath Wellawatta said the girls' parents had convived with the agents to prepare false documents.

The parents had done this to overcome poverty, Wellawatta said. These girls are from Kalawewa, Trincomalee, Batticaloa and Muttur. The FEB officials said these girls will not be sent again to live with their parents.

International Buddhist Conference

JANUARY 14 AT 1.00 P.M.: The Second International Buddhist Conference organised by the International Buddhist Organisation, will be held at the Bandaranaike Memorial International Conference Hall.

International delegates including Dr. Ven. Uditha Nayaka Thera, Chief Sangha Nayaka, Ramagnna Sect, Singapore and sister Mangala Lg Naichon and about 2,000 bhikkhus, bhikkhunis and lay persons will participate in the conference.

The organisation, with the assistance of several other organisations and individuals has built 14 houses for the tsunami affected in Akmeemana, Galle.

'Devadara' to be planted here

COLOMBO: Ministry of Indigenous Medicine has planned to cultivate 'Devadara' which could be utilised for manufacturing of various herbal medicines in Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka imports this medicine from India at present and it is very expensive.

The Ministry has already started feasible studies on cultivating this plant in Pattipola area under its "Osu Govi" Villages project. Indian National Medicinal Plant Board of the Health and Family Welfare Ministry's Executive Officer B.S. Sajjuwan has examined and recommended the Pattipola as a suitable area for commencement of the Devadara cultivation.

He has also granted the large stock of Devadara seeds sent by India to Minister of Indigenous Medicine Tissa Karaliyadda recently.