Sri Lanka

April 2004 | Risk Summary

Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapakse was sworn in to lead a government that is eight seats short of a majority in parliament, after President Chandrika Kumaratunga's Freedom Alliance won 105 seats in the 225-seat parliament in general elections on April 2. Voters ousted Ranil Wickremesinghe's pro-business United National Party which was responsible for a ceasefire with the Tamil Tigers and also gave seats to smaller parties at opposing ends of the island's ethnic divide. The new government says it will restart negotiations with the Tamil Tigers after talks stalled in April last year.

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