Sri Lanka's Acting President Wickremesinghe asks Speaker to nominate PM who is acceptable to all
Colombo(PTI): Sri Lanka's Acting President and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe on Wednesday asked Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena to nominate a Prime Minister who is acceptable to both the government and the Opposition.
In a statement, the Prime Minister's Office said that Prime Minister Wickremesinghe held a meeting with the Members of the Cabinet at his office on Monday.
All the ministers who participated in this meeting were of the opinion that as soon as there is an agreement to form an all-party government, they will hand over the responsibilities to that government, it said.
Accordingly, the ruling party and the opposition must form an all-party government.
Wickremesinghe is under pressure to quit before the expected resignation of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, who is said to be flying from the Maldives to Singapore.
The protesters who stormed Wickremesinghe's office on Wednesday are attempting to enter the parliament compound at the time of reporting. The police fired tear gas to disperse the protesters near the official residence of the speaker, police said.
A 26-year-old protester had died of breathing difficulties after being admitted to hospital. He was part of the group that stormed the prime minister's office this morning where 35 others had also been injured.
The Prime Minister's Media Division said the ruling party and the opposition must form an all-party Government.
President Rajapaksa on Wednesday fled to the Maldives from where he appointed Prime Minister Wickremesinghe as the acting President, escalating the political crisis and triggering a fresh wave of protests in the country reeling under the worst financial crisis in decades.
Speaker Abeywardena has said that President Rajapaksa has informed him over telephone that he will resign today as promised. He said the vote for the new president will take place on July 20.
President Rajapaksa issued a Gazette Extraordinary, appointing Wickremesinghe as the acting president to exercise, perform and discharge the powers, duties and functions of the Office of President with effect from July 13, 2022.
Wickremesinghe, who is now Acting President, has declared a state of emergency in the country and a curfew in the Western province has been imposed as protesters gathered near his office at Flower Road in Colombo.
Sri Lanka, a country of 22 million people, is under the grip of an unprecedented economic turmoil, the worst in seven decades, leaving millions struggling to buy food, medicine, fuel and other essentials. Prime Minister Wickremesinghe last week said Sri Lanka is now a bankrupt country.
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Dense fog disrupts Delhi airport operations, over 130 flights impacted
New Delhi: Flight operations at Indira Gandhi International Airport were severely disrupted on Monday due to very dense fog that drastically reduced visibility across the national capital, officials said.
According to a report published by The New Indian Express, more than 130 flights were impacted, including 128 cancellations 64 arrivals and 64 departures while eight flights were diverted to other airports as airlines struggled to operate under adverse weather conditions.
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Sharing a passenger advisory on X (formerly Twitter), the Delhi Airport informed that "flight operations are currently being conducted under CAT III conditions due to dense fog, which may result in delays or cancellations."
The disruption comes amid worsening weather and environmental conditions in the city. The India Meteorological Department (IMD) had issued an orange alert for very dense fog across Delhi-NCR, warning of travel delays and poor visibility during early morning hours.
As per the report, the city’s Air Quality Index (AQI) hovered around 460 in the early hours, placing it in the “hazardous” category. As many as 19 monitoring stations reported hazardous air quality, with Anand Vihar recording the worst levels. Other areas reported air quality ranging from “very poor” to “severe.”
Meanwhile, the Delhi government is considering a partnership with IIT Kanpur to deploy Artificial Intelligence for pinpointing pollution sources and evaluating their impact.
Officials reportedly said the environment department is working on a roadmap for the partnership, including institutional mechanisms and phased implementation. Environment Minister Manjinder Singh Sirsa said the focus would be on data-driven decision-making. “We are moving towards a model where decisions are driven by real-time data, source identification, and measurable outcomes, not reactive measures.” he said.
He proposed initiative aims to enable targeted interventions across sectors by strengthening Delhi’s ability to track pollution sources at a granular level.
