December 2025

Former allies from the now-defunct Tamil National Alliance (TNA) have resumed discussions on forming a united political front, raising the possibility of a reconstituted alliance ahead of the next electoral contest. The Ilankai Tamil Arasu Kachchi (ITAK), the TNA's principal constituent, and the Democratic Tamil National Alliance (DTNA)—a coalition of parties that broke away from the TNA—held talks at ITAK's Martin Road office in Jaffna last week to explore coordination on key political issues.

Sri Lankan President Anura Kumara Dissanayake says his government must convince the country — and the world — that Sri Lanka still has “a sustainable future” as it rebuilds from Cyclone Ditwah while emerging from a historic debt crisis and managing intensifying geopolitical competition in the Indian Ocean. In a rare and wide-ranging interview with Newsweek at the Presidential Secretariat in Colombo, Dissanayake described Ditwah as “catastrophic,” hitting just as Sri Lanka concluded a US$25 bill