http://tvnz.co.nz/world-news/sri-lanka-opposition-protest-rally-4020241

Sri Lanka opposition protest rally

Published: 8:54AM Thursday February 10, 2011 Source: Reuters

A few thousand opposition supporters marched in Sri Lanka's capital to demonstrate against higher food prices, part of an opposition call to launch Egypt-style mass protests against President Mahinda Rajapaksa.
The main opposition United National Party (UNP) earlier this week urged one million people to take to the streets and mimic the pressure brought on Egypt's government, but only about 3,000 people marched through the capital Colombo.
The UNP, given a drubbing at all the elections since Rajapaksa won power by a narrow margin in late 2005, has struggled to stir grass roots support and has been locked in a leadership struggle since parliamentary elections in April.
Rajapaksa still enjoys overwhelming popularity for winning the three-decade war against the Tamil Tiger separatists in May 2009, despite complaints his government is increasingly autocratic and unable to bring down food prices.

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"Today's income is not even enough to lick something. How can we eat three meals a day? Most of us now eat only one meal a day," said Latha Gunesekara, a mother of two, at the march.

Sri Lanka opposition protest rally

A few thousand opposition supporters marched in Sri Lanka's capital to
demonstrate against higher food prices, part of an opposition call to launch
Egypt-style mass protests against President Mahinda Rajapaksa.

The main opposition United National Party (UNP) earlier this week urged one
million people to take to the streets and mimic the pressure brought on
Egypt's government, but only about 3,000 people marched through the capital
Colombo.

http://tvnz.co.nz/world-news/sri-lanka-opposition-protest-rally-4020241

http://www.asiantribune.com/news/2009/12/08/us-senate-report-sri-lanka-us-cannot-afford-lose-sri-lanka-due-its-strategic-importa
Excerpt:

US Senate Report on Sri Lanka: U.S. Cannot Afford to Lose Sri Lanka due to its Strategic Importance

Tue, 2009-12-08 14:50 — editor

• USA

Daya Gamage – US National Correspondent Asian Tribune

Washington, D.C. 08 December (Asiantribune.com):

Senator John F. Kerry

Washington, D.C. 08 December (Asiantribune.com): The United States Senate Foreign Relations Committee report, a bipartisan endeavor, on Sri Lanka released December 07 was a thorough review of the failed U.S. policies and approach toward Sri Lanka in recent years and recommends that the U.S. needs to adopt a fresh approach to this South Asian nation declaring “the U.S. Government has invested relatively little in the economy or the security sector in Sri Lanka, instead focusing more on IDPs and civil society. As a result, Sri Lanka has grown politically and economically isolated from the West.”
The report shared by the Senate Committee chairman Democratic Party’s John F. Kerry and the committee’s ranking member Republican Richard G. Lugar further observes: “This strategic drift will have consequences for U.S. interests in the region. Along with our legitimate humanitarian and political concerns, U.S. policymakers have tended to underestimate Sri Lanka’s geostrategic importance for American interests. Sri Lanka is located at the nexus of crucial maritime trading routes in the Indian Ocean connecting Europe and the Middle East to China and the rest of Asia.”