Gender –sensitive projects - a priority

The objective of the project is to improve the quality of life for conflict-affected and isolated rural poor communities, especially women, through a community-driven, participatory livelihood development programme linked to the rehabilitation and maintenance of rural access roads. It is expected that gender-sensitive development projects such as this will improve post-conflict reconstruction and also benefit those marginalized and or deprived by the conflict.

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Mid-East, still the US’stumbling block

Regardless of who emerges victorious at the next Presidential poll, the Middle East will continue to be the Gordian Knot of US foreign policy. Unfortunately, the indications are that the ‘knot’ is unlikely to be ‘cut’ in a hurry, which means that the Middle East would continue to bleed. If the US administration is to pause awhile, it would figure out that the unresolved Middle East conflict provides the fuel that keeps many a regional conflict raging. It is the continuing spread of religious fundamentalism that renders seemingly unresolvable numerous armed and political conflicts around the world, and they are overtly or circuitously linked to the spread of religious militancy, which is in turn linked to the unresolved Middle East conundrum to a considerable degree.

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Minneri reservoir and the colonization Scheme

Habitation sites existed in and around Polonnaruva and Minneriya from the inception of agricultural settlements in the first millennium B.C. Brahmi inscriptions at places such as Enderagala, Duvegala, Galkandegama Kanda and Mutugala indicate that after the introduction of Buddhism in the third century B.C., these settlements were able to feed a substantial number of monks living in caves around Polonnaruva and Minneriya.

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Transparency with regard to Law

The importance of recent legislation to change the electoral system for Local Government elections was such that it clearly made sense on all sides to refrain from trying to improve the content of the Bill, but instead to concentrate on making it law. The government has after all agreed to further amendments by mutual consent later on, including increasing the proportion of those to be elected on a list basis to 40 percent.

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