Sri Lanka Economic Crisis: Sri Lanka is negotiating with the IMF for a bailout.
Colombo:
Sri Lanka Crisis: Lanka's ruling coalition lost its parliamentary majority as former allies urged the President's resignation, following days of protests over the island nation's crippling economic crisis.
Here are the top 10 updates on this big story
- Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa's ruling coalition lost its majority in Parliament today after at least 41 lawmakers walked out of the alliance.
- Sri Lanka's Finance Minister, Ali Sabry, resigned today a day after being sworn in, amid growing public unrest over a worsening economic crisis. President Rajapaksa had named four new ministers in the cabinet yesterday, including Mr Sabry.
- Sri Lanka's opposition yesterday dismissed President Rajapaksa's invitation to join a unity government as "nonsensical" and instead demanded his resignation over the country's worsening shortages of food, fuel and medicines.
- Deputy Parliament Speaker Ranjith Siyambalapitiya resigned as the Parliament reconvened today for the first time after the state of emergency was declared in Sri Lanka as the country grapples with protests and mounting demands for the President's resignation over a worsening economic crisis.
- The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said on Tuesday that it is monitoring political and economic developments in Sri Lanka "very closely" as public unrest in the island nation grows amid its worst economic crisis in decades.
- There have been mass public agitations against the ruling Rajapaksa family for its mishandling of the economic situation triggered by the foreign exchange crisis and the balance of payment issues.
- The country's central bank governor Ajith Cabraal stepped down on Monday after the cabinet quit to make way for a new administration to manage the spiralling economic crisis.
- On Sunday night, all 26 ministers aside from President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and his elder brother Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa stepped down.
- After the protests intensified, Internet service providers were ordered to block access to social media platforms, including Facebook, WhatsApp, Twitter and YouTube. The social media curbs were lifted in the second half of Sunday.
- The South Asian nation is facing severe shortages of food, fuel and other essentials -- along with record inflation and crippling power cuts -- in its most painful downturn since independence from Britain in 1948.
