SRI LANKA CABINET APPROVES BILL FOR COMPENSATION OF CIVIL WAR VICTIMS

The Sri Lanka cabinet has given the nod to a bill to set up an office of reparations to compensate victims of the three-decade civil war that plagued the island nation, cabinet spokesman Rajitha Senaratne said on Wednesday. The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), which fought for a separate Tamil homeland, was defeated by the Sri Lankan military in 2009 with the death of its supremo Velupillai Prabhakaran. “As part of implementing the resolutions by the United Nations Human Rights Council, the Cabinet endorsed a Bill to be enacted by Parliament for the payment of reparations in respect of war-affected and missing persons,” Senaratne, who also serves as the health minister, said.