Features
President needs to set targets high to gain world’s support
BY Jehan Perera
The situation in the country has become so dire that the government has decided that government workers should stay at home for two weeks. Government schools,too, have been directed to shut down along with government-supported private schools. Only a few of them would have the capacity to conduct online classes as was seen during the Covid lockdowns. In addition to being physically stunted, the way is being paved for a younger generation that is deficient in the growth of their mental and intellectual faculties. The crisis has become a great leveler. The rich and poor together are in the kilometers long lines for gasoline at the fuel pumping stations. Although those in the urban areas have higher incomes on average than their rural counterparts they are likely to be affected more by the sharp price rises in food.
The UN system has issued a call for international humanitarian assistance for Sri Lanka. A country that at the time it attained independence was the second most prosperous in Asia, and said to be the Switzerland of the East, has now become a basket case. It is ironic that what exploitative colonials did not do, our own national leaders have done. The UNICEF spokesperson for Sri Lanka has said on international media that children in Sri Lanka are the seventh most malnourished among the world’s 195 countries. He said that he had been to countries such as Yemen, Somalia and South Sudan, but Sri Lanka was a country like no other. There is no place within the country that those who were poor and hungry could go to. They could only hope to go abroad, he said, in response to the international media’s question about Sri Lankans migrating to other countries.
The warning signs of the disaster that has struck the country were seen as far back as three years ago. The then governor of the Central Bank, Dr Indrajit Coomaraswamy, warned that Sri Lanka was going to face a foreign currency crisis in the near future. He pointed to the massive loan repayments that had accumulated and would have to be paid soon. He said that the country could take remedial action, such as by going to the IMF, so that the effects of the crisis could be mitigated and with financial discipline the country could come out of it. These words were not heeded by the government and the President appointed another governor who went on a borrowing and money printing spree. It is likely that he convinced the all-powerful president that this was the way forward. With great power comes great responsibility. It is also said that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
FAILED PRESIDENT
It is in this context of unprecedented economic hardship that the slogan “Gota go home” resonates throughout the country. The presidency is an institution that has been much criticized by every party out of power and by civil society from its inception in 1978. It is rejected today by the main political parties including the ruling party whose ostensible position is that it should be abolished. The major opposition parties, too, support the abolition of the presidency. Previous presidents even campaigned and won presidential elections on the promise of abolishing the institution. But as stated by the 18th Century English poet, Alexander Pope, “Vice is a monster of so frightful mien, as to be hated needs but to be seen. Yet too oft, familiar with her face, we first endure, then pity, then embrace.”
The worst feature of the presidency is that it can be used to enforce arbitrary and ill thought policies as state policies. The President is the head of the government and head of the Cabinet of Ministers and has the power to appoint and sack ministers at his pleasure or displeasure. These decisions cannot be questioned in a court of law as it is provided by the constitution. This makes it difficult to challenge his decisions even when they are obviously ill advised and wrong. Thus, when the president decided to ban chemical fertilisers and pesticides and go in for 100 percent organic agriculture overnight many who should have known better failed to correct him. But this decision was to ruin the country as we see today with agricultural production plummeting by 50 percent. This single decision has impoverished the agricultural sector, contributed to the malnourishment prevalent in the country and even threatens mass hunger and food riots in the months to come. Only access to foreign aid, such as generated by the UN appeal for humanitarian assistance, can ward off the inevitable. The goodwill of the international community is key to the nurturing of Sri Lanka’s younger generation.
Perhaps in recognition of the policy disasters he has presided over, President Rajapaksa has declared that he does not want to go as a failed President. This seems as an acceptance of failure at present for which the President has apologized and his wish to continue to stay may not be the best option for the country. He has expressed resolve to continue at the helm, come hell or high water, until his term of office ends in two plus years. However, the president has also said that he will not seek re-election. This suggests a way forward for the president to redeem himself and leave behind a positive legacy. He can be the president who finally abolished the presidency which is now widely seen by the people as the root of political abuse of power and which most political parties also want abolished.
BIGGEST PRIZE
The president has provided the justification of the abolition of the presidency. He said that his observation has been that it is not possible for an executive presidency to coexist with an empowered prime minister. Either the presidency should be abolished or the parliament is kept out of governing. “My personal opinion is that if you have a presidency he must have full powers. Otherwise abolish executive presidency and go for full Westminster-style parliament.” If it is to be one or the other, the answer is clear that it should be the presidency that goes. Parliament is the more democratic, stable and safer option, as it provides a forum for debate and discussion, rather than relying on the sanity and judgment of one man. As seen in other countries also the President can decide in isolation with disastrous results as evidenced in the fertiliser ban. Even as the government seeks to find the foreign exchange and international assistance to sustain the economy, there is a way for President Rajapaksa to convince the world that his government is worth supporting. This would be to work towards the abolition of the presidency, and provide a time frame, so that he is the last Executive President of Sri Lanka. The other would be to find a political solution that gave rise to three decades of war and destruction that has contributed to the present plight of the country. Both of these are problems that the country has been burdened with for decades and been unable to resolve. The ethnic conflict gave rise to war and a large part of the country’s resources were diverted to the war. The country fell into the debt trap partly on account of expenditures devoted to the war. Even today, more than 13 years after the end of the war, the military budget is the largest single component of the national budget, dwarfing the expenditures on health and education combined which is unacceptable in the context of economic collapse.
President Rajapaksa has cultivated the reputation as the leader who kept the country united even though it was through warfare and not by winning the hearts and minds of all the people. He has assets he can utilize for the purpose of a mutually acceptable solution to the ethnic conflict. The Prime Minister he appointed, Ranil Wickremesinghe, is an astute tactician who is trusted as being non-racist and who has never used communalism to win elections. Foreign Minister Prof G L Peiris is a legal expert who, along with Dr Neelan Tiruchelvam of the main Tamil political party of that time, devised the most liberal constitutional formula to end the ethnic conflict and share power between the ethnic communities. Opposition leader Sajith Premadasa and JVP leader Anura Kumara Dissanayake are both in favour of abolishing the Executive Presidency and are non-racist in their politics. If the government is to justify itself, a roadmap to both resolve the ethnic conflict and abolish the Executive Presidency prior to the next election is necessary.
Eight babies have been born in the UK using genetic material from three people to prevent devastating and often fatal conditions, doctors say.
The method, pioneered by UK scientists, combines the egg and sperm from a mum and dad with a second egg from a donor woman.
The technique has been legal here for a decade but we now have the first proof it is leading to children born free of incurable mitochondrial disease.
These conditions are normally passed from mother to child, starving the body of energy.
This can cause severe disability and some babies die within days of being born. Couples know they are at risk if previous children, family members or the mother has been affected.
Children born through the three-person technique inherit most of their DNA, their genetic blueprint, from their parents, but also get a tiny amount, about 0.1%, from the second woman. This is a change that is passed down the generations.
None of the families who have been through the process are speaking publicly to protect their privacy, but have issued anonymous statements through the Newcastle Fertility Centre where the procedures took place.
“After years of uncertainty this treatment gave us hope – and then it gave us our baby,” said the mother of a baby girl. “We look at them now, full of life and possibility, and we’re overwhelmed with gratitude.”
The mother of a baby boy added: “Thanks to this incredible advancement and the support we received, our little family is complete. “The emotional burden of mitochondrial disease has been lifted, and in its place is hope, joy, and deep gratitude.”
Mitochondria are tiny structures inside nearly every one of our cells. They are the reason we breathe as they use oxygen to convert food into the form of energy our bodies use as fuel.
Defective mitochondria can leave the body with insufficient energy to keep the heart beating as well as causing brain damage, seizures, blindness, muscle weakness and organ failure.
About one in 5,000 babies are born with mitochondrial disease. The team in Newcastle anticipate there is demand for 20 to 30 babies born through the three-person method each year.
Some parents have faced the agony of having multiple children die from these diseases.
Mitochondria are passed down only from mother to child. So this pioneering fertility technique uses both parents and a woman who donates her healthy mitochondria.
The science was developed more than a decade ago at Newcastle University and the Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and a specialist service opened within the NHS in 2017.
There was a case of epilepsy, which cleared up by itself and one child has an abnormal heart rhythm which is being successfully treated.
These are not thought to be connected to defective mitochondria. It is not known whether this is part of the known risks of IVF, something specific to the three-person method or something that has been detected only because the health of all babies born through this technique is monitored intensely.
Another key question hanging over the approach has been whether defective mitochondria would be transferred into the healthy embryo and what the consequences could be.
The results show that in five cases the diseased mitochondria were undetectable. In the other three, between 5% and 20% of mitochondria were defective in blood and urine samples.
This is below the 80% level thought to cause disease. It will take further work to understand why this occurred and if it can be prevented.
Prof Mary Herbert, from Newcastle University and Monash University, said: “The findings give grounds for optimism. However, research to better understand the limitations of mitochondrial donation technologies, will be essential to further improve treatment outcomes.”
The breakthrough gives hope to the Kitto family.
Kat’s youngest daughter Poppy, 14, has the disease. Her eldest Lily, 16, may pass it onto her children.
Poppy is in a wheelchair, is non-verbal and is fed through a tube.
“It’s impacted a huge part of her life,” says Kat, “we have a lovely time as she is, but there are the moments where you realize how devastating mitochondrial disease is”.
Despite decades of work there is still no cure for mitochondrial disease, but the chance to prevent it being passed on gives hope to Lily.
“It’s the future generations like myself, or my children, or my cousins, who can have that outlook of a normal life,” she says.
The UK not only developed the science of three-person babies, but it also became the first country in the world to introduce laws to allow their creation after a vote in Parliament in 2015.
There was controversy as mitochondria have DNA of their own, which controls how they function.
It means the children have inherited DNA from their parents and around 0.1% from the donor woman.
Any girls born through this technique would pass this onto their own children, so it is a permanent alteration of human genetic inheritance.
This was a step too far for some when the technology was debated, raising fears it would open the doors to genetically-modified “designer” babies.
Prof Sir Doug Turnbull, from Newcastle University, told me: “I think this is the only place in the world this could have happened, there’s been first class science to get us to where we are, there been legislation to allow it to move into clinical treatment, the NHS to help support it and now we’ve got eight children that seem to free of mitochondrial disease, what a wonderful result.”
Liz Curtis, the founder of the Lily Foundation charity said: “After years of waiting, we now know that eight babies have been born using this technique, all showing no signs of mito.
“For many affected families, it’s the first real hope of breaking the cycle of this inherited condition.”
[BBC]
Fast-breaking developments in US-Russia relations and US-Ukraine ties could very well be pointing to the wasting war in the Ukraine theatre currently approaching a dangerous tipping point. The US has reached the crucial decision to equip Ukraine with the necessary lethal arms to counter Russia’s ongoing missile and drone strikes on it and if implemented could mark a qualitatively new phase in the conflict between the West and Russia in Ukraine, which could have serious implications for regional and even world peace.
‘We want to make sure Ukraine can do what it wants to do, US President Donald Trump is quoted as saying following a recent meeting he had with NATO chief Mark Rutte in Washington, subsequent to indicating that the US will be sending ‘top of the line weapons’ to Ukraine through NATO countries. Such weaponry could include Patriot air defence systems which are generally seen as an effective answer in particular to Russia’s air strikes on Ukraine.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is on record that he had thanked the US President for his ‘willingness to support Ukraine and to continue working together to stop the killings and establish a lasting and just peace.’
Going ahead, the West would need to bear in mind that the supplying of exceptionally lethal arms to the Ukraine through its mediation could be seen by the Putin regime as hostile acts directed at the Russian state. That is, the West would be considered as involving itself physically in the ongoing hostilities between Russia and the Ukraine, necessitating the West, and more specifically NATO countries, to brace for Russian military strikes on them. Needless to say, such an eventuality would bode ill for international stability and peace.
Accordingly the West would need to assess very finely the consequences of its decisions on the Ukraine front. While the US President’s recent statements on these questions could be seen by some as mere rhetoric Trump is also on record as having indicated that his patience is wearing thin with Putin over the central issue of bringing peace to the Ukraine.
Inasmuch as Trump needs to trod gingerly going ahead so must Putin. In the event of full scale hostilities breaking out between the East and West in the Eastern European theatre no camp would stand to gain; this ought to be plain to the main antagonists, since they are evenly matched in terms of military capability. Even if the conflict in the Ukraine stagnates at a proxy stage, the costs for both sides would be staggering in human and material terms. Russia would need to recollect Afghanistan and the US would need to take itself back to the numerous proxy wars it fought in the then Third World.
However, although there are great uncertainties and perils for the world in the event of the current proxy war in the Ukraine degenerating into a more frontal East-West military confrontation in Europe, President Trump could be considered as holding the ‘Trump card’ to force a negotiated end to the present crisis.
This ‘Trump card’ takes the form of the economic strife which may descend upon the world in the event of the Trump administration going fully ahead with its ‘reciprocal tariff’ based trade wars with the majority of countries.
The US under President Trump may not be the most popular major power but it continues to be critical to the world’s current economic health. However much unpalatable it may be, the truth is that the economic vibrancy and prosperity of the US are key to many a country’s material survival. This is on account of the multiple economic linkages between the US and the rest of the world. The weaker the economy the greater is its dependence on the US and its largesse. For example, Sri Lanka knows this only too well.
The Trump administration is on record that it would be imposing what are described as ‘secondary tariffs’ on those countries whose economic operations are even indirectly benefiting Russia and if implemented could bring about crippling economic hardships for quite a few countries.
Major economic powers, China and India, are fully aware of these consequences. This is the reason why they would prefer not to undermine current economic arrangements between them and the US and between the latter and the rest of the world.
The above positions should not be misunderstood to mean that the rest of the world should be in a subservient relationship with the US. There is no question of the US exercising some sort of suzerainty over the rest of the world. This is not the case but in international relations the primacy of economics over politics may need to be recognized; economic realism needs be a cornerstone of foreign policy.
It would be quite some time before the BRICS grouping reaches the commanding heights of the world economy. Right now, it would be self-defeating, given the US’ continued economic power, for the South in particular to gloss over the might of the West and depend lopsidedly on the BRICS powers for its entire economic sustenance and survival. Indeed, a Non-aligned foreign policy remains best for the South.
It does not follow from the above considerations that the West could continue to turn a blind eye to the dangers posed to it and the world from the Ukraine conflict. Immense caution and foresight would need to go into its moves to arm Ukraine with its more sophisticated and exceptionally lethal weaponry. A cornered enemy in the battlefield, suffering overwhelming losses, cannot be expected to be continually discreet. With its patience relentlessly wearing thin it could unleash its Weapons of Mass Destruction, thus driving the world to the brink of destruction.
Accordingly, it is hoped that better counsel would prevail over all concerned and that differences would be resolved at the negotiating table. May be harsh economic realities would come to dictate terms and propel the quarters concerned to give cool rationality rather than the avarice born of self-aggrandizement a chance in their dealings with each other.
I’m sure the whole of Sri Lanka is eagerly looking forward to the arrival of Bollywood heartthrob Shah Rukh Khan, due in Colombo, next month, for the grand opening of the City of Dreams.
What makes Shah Rukh Khan standout is not only his acting prowess but also his looks.
At 59-plus, he looks absolutely great … or, let’s say, simply awesome.
Generally, people in their late fifties, or even in their mid-fifties, look frail, and some can’t even walk steadily.
So, what is Shah Rukh Khan’s secret to looking young, and, remember, he will be hitting 60 on 2nd November, 2025!
Yes, diet, is given top priority where Shah Rukh Khan is concerned.
While many of us need around four meals a day, Shah Rukh focuses on two main meals a day – lunch and dinner – and avoids snacking or elaborate dishes.
His meals often include sprouts, grilled chicken, broccoli, and sometimes dhal. And don’t we all love dhal!
While he enjoys sharing meals with others when he’s with family or travelling, even if it means indulging in richer dishes, like biryani or parathas, his core diet remains consistent, he says.
Wonder what would be his menu during his very short stay in Sri Lanka! Perhaps traditional Indian foods like tandoori chicken and mutton biriyani, roti, parathas, food cooked with ghee! He also likes the drink lassi, I’m told.
Perhaps, we should also ask him to check out some of our dishes, as well … a good rice and curry menu, with dhal!
It isn’t diet alone that has given Shah Rukh his young look but, he says, exercise, too, has played an important part, especially where his physique is concerned.
Young Shah Rukh Khan in the early ‘90s
Shah Rukh refers to his fitness journey during the pandemic, saying during the pandemic he decided to work hard on his body.
He focused on building a strong physique, and, by exercising consistently, he achieved a body he is proud of today.
Another factor responsible for his leaner, healthier body, and a sharper appearance, is that he has completely quit smoking
This major lifestyle change has also helped him maintain a leaner, healthier body, and a sharper appearance, he says.
Strangely, his sleep routine is totally different to what experts say. We are told that we need between seven and nine hours of sleep per night for optimal health.
Shah Rukh admits he has an unusual sleep schedule and this generally happens when he has a busy shooting schedule.
He usually goes to bed around 5.00 am and sleeps for about four–five hours. Even though it’s not ideal, he manages it around his busy shooting schedule.
In fact, Shah Rukh is a night person and usually loves working in the night. He also loves night shoots. He had said, “I usually head to bed around 5.00 am. On shooting days, I wake up by 9 or 10 in the morning. After coming back home late at night — sometimes around 2.00 am — I take a shower and get a workout in before I finally sleep.”
On the work front, he will be seen next in the movie ‘King’, due for a grand release in 2026.
Shah Rukh Khan continues to inspire millions with his commitment to fitness and I hope Sri Lankans will take a cue from this Bollywood heartthrob and maintain a leaner, healthier body.
President opens Wax Museum at the historic Ehelepola Walawwa in Kandy
Police SI’s who demanded free service at a SPA interdicted
Dozens dead, others missing in huge fire at hypermarket in Iraq’s Kut
Babies made using three people’s DNA are born free of hereditary disease
Indictments served on former Minister Keheliya Rambukwella and family
Deepti digs deep to deliver India’s four-wicket win
‘Dates have the highest sugar content to fight Coronavirus’
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