Only essential services to operate from midnight
newsfirst.lk
newsfirst.lk
Bad government policies, and over spending creating inflation and high prices for goods, with a response of price controls to control the prices, which results in even fewer goods available, then government rationing because the goods aren't available, further reducing ability to produce anything of value...
And it doesn't have to be this way! At each stage, you could just not do the next step in the spiral. Thing would be bad for a bit, but you wouldn't bring the nation to poverty.
(Although this has been headline news for a few days in the mainstream press[1], which helps.)
The country is already $700M in debt, has no cash reserves to pay for imports, credit by national banks being refused.
It does suck for Sri Lanka. But; we can't solve every problem, and thus worrying about them wastes valuable time and energy that is better spent solving our problems. Secure your oxygen mask before helping others.
Similarly, I think its negligent and borderline misinformation that the title of this post doesn't include the location.
I've seen op-eds and articles in western media, and a few in EMEA media, that all talk about sweeping changes and reforms but they all seem like the usual hand-waving or 'easier said than done' articles, and not really a plan for how to get there.
My (very limited) understanding is that the current government has been in power less than a year(?), and so must have inherited a lot of these issues.
Anyone seen any other articles on this that have more concrete information?
The current president "Gotabaya Rajapaksha" is the Brother of "Mahinda Rajapaksha" who was the president before him.
When Mahinda Rajapaksha was in power, Gotabaya was the defence minister.
When Gotabaya was recently elected the president, Mahainda was the Prime-minister.
In Sri Lanka it doesn't matter which party you elect as the government, ministers jump from one party to the other always, they fight and throw chairs at each other in the parliament and on stages, but the very same day they will all meet and have a party with each-other. (I wish I was exaggerating)
there was a different government before Gotabaya was president and After Mahinda was president. But, it was basically the same old culprits.
The Rajapaksha family helped end a 30 year civil war, it was a bloody horrific war, however as this was the most important issue for most Sri Lankans at the time, helping end this meant the Rajapaksha's were seen as the saviors,they were at the time considered kings, people used to cry in joy when they see them, they were that loved and celebrated within the country.
This gave them a lot of power and popularity, anyone with a Rajapaksha name ran for all types of government positions, and most of them actually won, people accepted them with open arms. At the same time with the power the Rajapaksha's had they were able to promote their family members, some of them who didn't even have a highschool degree in to high ranking positions within government institutions.
So, half of the family was elected by the people, the rest was promoted due to nepotism.
What happened was a decade worth of corruption, a family that didn't have much, some of whom worked as gas pump operators in the US (the current president) suddenly became billionaires. One of the main culprits was an animal named Basil Rajapaksha, he was so corrupt people called him "Mr 10%" because if any construction or any type of project were to start, you have to allocate 10% of the profits and the initial investment to Basil rajapaksha.
If I were to write all the corruption, human rights violations and the day light robberies committed by the rajapuksha family we would be here all day.
Sri Lanka is a majority Buddhist country, in Buddhism we are taught of Karma, and how what you do to others will one day return back to you. And as a Sri Lankan this is what I feel is happening to us now. The sinhalese majority of Sri lanka, killed, looted and raped Tamil people which led to the 30+ year civil war, and we encouraged and looked the otherway when the rajapaksha family & co killed, raped and looted the Tamil population in the name of stopping the war. We looked the other way when they destroyed someone else's future because it was easier than finding a sustainable solution.
If I manage to survive this and one day have children, this is all I would tell them, "If you see an injustice, speak up, do something about it, because otherwise, they will come for you and you will be all alone".
Something I didn't learn about until recently [2] was Glocalization. Wikipedia [3] says it's been around since the 80s. Perhaps now's a good time to bring it out again.
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strauss%E2%80%93Howe_generatio...
I'd also not heard of Glocalization, but it reminds me of a couple of topics that are covered in Fritjof Capra's Systems View of Life book (also a course), around emergent behaviour in complex systems and how this competes with top down command and control ideas (or in organisations as the formal and informal networks).
What, is everyone told this???
I've heard from one person, who delivers oil, that our refineries are able to switch relatively easily. So, I'm unsure what the whole story is, but that's what the other comment was referring to. We definitely do refining in the US and there are several refineries near me.
But why would you do that, instead of selling the expensive oil and buying some cheap one back?
That's not to say the industry wouldn't go belly up from suddenly having a bunch of unused, expensive oil refineries, but our ability to refine US oil wouldn't be in peril from a lack of refineries.
Who would want to build a refinery when the current President has stated he wants to shut down the fossil fuel industry?
There is a big problem with banning US oil exports. Oil is priced in US dollars and this only works if the US continues to be a global political player. If the US stops exports, the price of oil in dollars will rise so much that most other countries will have no choice but to start importing from Russia again - and in a currency that is not US dollars.
Overnight, the US will experience rapid inflation due to all the printed dollars losing value for the rest of the world.
https://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=pet&s=m...
The audience that by definition would go "What is that? Mh! Nice to know!".
Yes. ...In general. Specifically, this one is a title that comes from a news company with TLD consistent to it. Had it been reported by The Guardian or the NYT, they would have titled it differently.
Edit: urgh I know it’s a shit comment, but frankly I’m so disheartened with seeing another country go down it’s just depressing
Edit: it is one case in which the following appears exceptionally justifiable:
https://thediplomat.com/2022/06/sri-lanka-sends-2-ministers-...
> Sri Lanka is sending two government ministers to Russia to negotiate for fuel - one of the necessities nearly exhausted amid the Indian Ocean island nation’s economic collapse. // The development comes as Washington and its allies aim to cut off energy imports from Russia in line with sanctions over its war on Ukraine. Since the invasion in late February, global oil prices have skyrocketed, sparking a number of countries to seek out Russian crude, which is being offered at a steep discount
No, that is not what I said. I said (there implicitly and concisely, then explicitly nearby) that in this occasion and context - national news website issuing a title that implies "in this Country" - the TLD was revealing and will probably in general be revealing. This reasoning is of course not valid in general for other cases.
In Bayesian terms, had the TLD been '.tv' the chances of the subject being Tuvalu would have increased only slightly, yet with other multipliers set as high given such a title.
I am aware there is a .lk domain, but there are thousands of domains out there and I don't think most people would know it of hand.
https://srilankabrief.org/what-sri-lanka-needs-is-not-bannin...
You don't get to simultaneously claim it's putin causing the lack of grain, while complaining about him selling grain.
Sorry, but this is an attempt to cause another wave of people sinking on their way from Africa somewhere in the Mediterranean on crappy boats. That will surely make western EU governments feel the pressure.