News
Lanka lifts ban on Qatar Charity as it tries to secure fuel supply from Doha
By SHIHAR ANEEZ
ECONOMYNEXT – Sri Lanka has lifted a ban on Qatar Charity, a top minister said, months after the government froze the charity’s accounts accusing it of funding Islamic terrorism together with a prominent lawyer
A former police minister and a close ally of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa Sarath Weerasekara told parliament on January 07 2021 that the ringleader of the Easter Sunday suicide bombers Zaharan Hashim had conducted lectures in an organisation maintained by Sri Lankan lawyer Hejaz Hisbullah. The organisation, named ‘Pearl of Unity’, and its local branc was funded by Qatar Charity which Weerasekara claimed was banned by the United Nations.
The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) subsequently froze the accounts of Qatar Charity in Sri Lanka.
The move, along with President Rajapaksa’s flat refusal to honour Qatar’s request through the Organisation of Islamic Countries (OIC) to stop cremating Sri Lanka’s minority Muslims who died of COVID-19, soured the Middle Eastern nation’s relations with Sri Lanka.
Power and Energy Minister Kanchana Wijesekera who led a delegation to discuss possibilities of securing a fuel credit line to Sri Lanka said he met Qatar Charity officials in Doha on June 29.
“Met the Officials of the Qatar Charity yesterday. Conveyed the message that the Defense Ministry has informed the Attorney General its decision to lift the ban on the fund which was imposed in 2019,” Wijesekera tweeted.
He also discussed the Charity’s work in Sri Lanka and globally.
Wijesekera’s statement on lifting the ban comes at a time Sri Lanka is gradually coming to a standstill as it does not have any fuel imports until mid next month. Wijesekera on Sunday June 26 before leaving to Qatar told reporters that he was exploring possibilities of importing fuel from the oil-rich country.
During his visit, Wijesekera met Saad Sherida Al-Kaabi, the Qatar Minister of State for Energy Affairs and the President and CEO of Qatar Energy, and discussed the supply of petroleum products, liquid petroleum (LP) gas and liquefied natural gas (LNG) to Sri Lanka to overcome the energy crisis with the assistance of Qatar Energy and the Qatar Development Fund.
The minister also met Deputy Director General of the Qatar Fund for Development and said that he “discussed a possible credit line facility for petroleum and gas supply” and was “informed that funds has been allocated for medical supplies and will consider the request for a credit facility [and] support the IMF program”.
Despite many leaders of the ruling Sri Lanka Podujana Peremuna (SLPP) approaching Middle Eastern countries for fuel, President Rajapaksa administration has hardly got a positive response, government officials told EconomyNext.
The legal case involved with Qatar Charity saw the arrest of Hejaz Hisbullah Hisbullah by the CID on April 14, 2020, who was placed under a detention order by President Rajapaksa, under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) for allegedly “aiding and abetting” the Easter Sunday bombers and for engaging in activities deemed “detrimental to religious harmony among communities.”
He was detained for a long time without being charged. However, amid mounting international pressure, the government charged him before a court released him on bail early this year.
Qatar is one of the top foreign employment providers for Sri Lanka along with the United Arab Emirates.
Sri Lankan diplomats in the Middle East have told EconomyNext that the governments there do not give as much priority to Sri Lankan issues as they did before the island nation’s political leaders’ action soured diplomatic relations.
An Australian woman has given birth to rare, naturally-conceived identical quadruplets after a pregnancy described as “extremely high risk” by the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital.
The four girls, who were delivered via caesarean section at 28 weeks and four days on 14 July, were monozygotic quadruplets – where a single fertilised egg splits into four embryos.
The hospital said the girls’ mother, 34-year-old Jenitar Na’amoana, and her husband Jortham, already had four children and were taken by “immense surprise” when told to expect quadruplets.
Dr Alexa Bendall, who cared for the mother from the start of her pregnancy, estimated identical quadruplets occur “at one in every 15 million pregnancies” and said “but to share the same placenta – this is unheard of”.
Bendall, who is a maternal foetal medicine specialist and obstetrician, said such a pregnancy was very high-risk, with the hospital admitting Na’amoana as an inpatient at 25 weeks so she could be monitored.
“We always said that if we could get her to 28 weeks, we would be doing well,” Bendall said.
“So the fact that we’ve got four beautiful, healthy babies born at 28 weeks and four days is incredible and we’re very happy to be a part of it,” she added.
“Jenitar has taken everything in her stride from day one… she has somehow dodged every complication and risk for both herself and her babies,” Bendall said.
The newborn girls have been named Emily, Harriet, Catherine, and also Alexa, after Alexa Bendall, who described it as “a beautiful tribute”.
The babies will stay in the hospital’s neonatal intensive care unit until they grow to full term and are “currently doing extremely well”, Bendall added.
The parents’ other children are between one and 10 years old and the mother has recently launched an online fundraising campaign to help buy a van with at least 10 seats.
In a message alongside the fundraiser, which has already received over A$37,000 (£19,261) in donations, Na’amoana wrote: “Our four precious miracles have arrived safely, and while our hearts are overflowing with gratitude, the reality of caring for four newborns at once has brought challenges we never could have imagined.”
Naturally conceived quadruplets are extremely rare, with doctors estimating the odds at about one in 700,000 births.
(BBC)
… bribe giver departs Colombo port
The Merchant Shipping Secretariat (MSS) is investigating a complaint received from the Captain of an Indonesian flagged vessel Sensho that he had to pay an official USD 5,000 bribe to facilitate what our sources called port state control inspection.
Sources said that the cement carrier arrived at the Colombo Port, on Friday, and departed after having passed the rigorous inspection. Responding to queries, sources said that after paying the bribe, the vessel’s Captain has lodged complaints with MSS and the Commission to Investigate Allegation of Bribery or Corruption (CIABOC).
In spite of the government’s high profile anti-corruption drive there seemed to be fresh cases, sources said, adding that MSS had received a comprehensive complaint. The vessel had departed Colombo for Jeddah, sources said.
“The issue at hand is whether there have been unreported cases of MSS personnel receiving bribes,” sources said, acknowledging that the Captain, instead of immediately bringing the demand for USD 5,000 bribe to the MSS, had paid it and departed Colombo. (SF)
An opposition political group, styled as Dinana Dakuna, has accused the Committee of Public Finance (COPF) of protecting the masterminds behind the USD 2.5 mn theft from the Treasury.
Commenting on the recent COPF report on the theft, the group has alleged that the all-party parliamentary grouping made an attempt to shift the blame to the Central Bank as part of a cover-up. It has described the COPF report as a deliberate attempt to suppress the truth.
The group said that the COPF conveniently asserted that the theft took place due to the inexperience of officers concerned, thereby diverting the attention from those who perpetrated it.
An alleged attempt to portray the collapse of the administrative set-up that led to the USD 2.5 mn theft as a human resource problem, has also been questioned by Dinana Dakuna.
Rare identical quadruplets born in Australia
Showers will occur in the Western, Sabaragamuwa and North-western provinces and in Kandy, Nuwara-Eliya, Galle and Matara districts
Merchant Shipping Secretariat probes bribery scandal
Theft of USD 2.5 mn: Dinana Dakuna claims COPF trying to protect mastermind
COPF chief slams security sticker scam
CAA urged to protect soap users
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