Monitor Memo

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — Mahinda Kahandagama, the former Colombo municipal politician whose torn red shirt became one of the most recognizable images of Sri Lanka's 2022 political upheaval, was arrested on Monday night on suspicion of possessing crystal methamphetamine, the police said. Officers from the Colombo Central Crime Investigation Bureau detained Mr. Kahandagama near a restaurant in Mirihana and said they recovered a quantity of the drug, known in Sri Lanka as "Ice," from him. The location

JAFFNA, Sri Lanka — A 31-year-old woman who taught cookery and hospitality in Jaffna was stabbed to death in her family's home on Monday evening, and the man suspected of killing her died later that night after being struck by a train, the police said. People who knew the woman said the man had persistently pursued her despite her repeated rejections. The woman, Anne Laksha Ignatius, was attacked at a house on Temple Road in Nallur after the man forced his way inside, according to the police. H

MULLAITIVU, Sri Lanka — Young people and community activists in Mullaitivu District are opposing a proposal to move the district office of the National Youth Services Council from Mankulam to Oddusuddan, and are calling on the government to build the office on land in Mankulam that was set aside for it in 2012. The land, a plot along the A9 highway, was cleared and fenced for a district office 14 years ago, but no building was ever put up. The council's Mullaitivu office still operates from ren

KILINOCHCHI, Sri Lanka — Her parents named her Samarazhagi, from the Tamil words samar, meaning war, and azhagi, meaning beauty. She was born in the final years of Sri Lanka's civil war, when Tamil families in the north were living through some of the worst violence of the conflict. On Oct. 1, observed in Sri Lanka as World Children's Day, Samarazhagi died by suicide. She was 17. Residents of her village, Uruthirapuram, and people familiar with her family say she left a letter alleging that sh

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka —Travelers from Sri Lanka's Tamil-majority north say tuk-tuk drivers near the country's main international airport are charging thousands of rupees for a few-kilometer ride from a bus stop to the terminal. The complaints center on the 18th Mile Post junction, known in Sinhala as Dahata Kanuwa, near Bandaranaike International Airport in Katunayake. Long-distance buses drop passengers at or near the junction, and travelers must find their own transportation for the rest of the