RIYADH: Forty-one Sri Lankan workers, all of them women, have been stranded in Riyadh since March because they were not given their assigned jobs by their local sponsor.
“The local agent in Colombo recruited the workers for a cleaning company, which is unable to deploy the workers since it has a dispute with the concerned hospital (where the workers were to be deployed),” Nimal Ranawake, the Sri Lankan Embassy’s labor counselor, told Arab News on Saturday.
The diplomat added that the sponsor has promised suitable placement as soon as the dispute between the cleaning company and the hospital is settled.
Meanwhile, five months into the women’s ordeal, six women have reportedly fallen ill and relatives of the stranded workers say they are not being adequately accommodated with hygienic conditions or food. Without access to the workers, Arab News was unable to confirm the claims.
Relatives of some of the women say they were told their loved ones would be working as cleaners for a company called Rasik Al-Mussalla and that a Colombo-based labor recruiter called New Trans Gulf Co. promised the women immediate placement for SR650 (about $174) a month with food and lodging.
L. Ruhunuge, assistant general manager of Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment, told Arab News the bureau has requested the Sri Lankan Embassy to help the six women who have fallen ill return home.
“We have also requested the mission to supply dry rations and toiletries to the stranded workers, since the company is not supplying any food,” Ruhunuge said. “We cannot tolerate this situation for a long time. Either the sponsor has to give them employment or repatriate them home.”
The Kingdom has a Sri Lankan population of 550,000 workers, a majority of them female domestic servants.
Ruhunuge said the Colombo government’s efforts to increase the wages of Sri Lankan overseas workers has led remittances by foreign workers to jump from $2.9 billion in 2008 to $3.3 billion last year.http://arabnews.com/saudiarabia/article93508.ece

2.Police inaction on Siyatha attack
Colombo: Kariyapperuma family members, owners of Siyatha TV yesterday told media that they will not cow down to intimidatory tactics, after their Siyatha TV office was attacked.
According to reliable sources, police have so far failed to launch an inquiry into Friday’s arson attack directed at the Siyatha TV and Radio station situated at Hunupitiya, Colombo 2, and owned by popular film actress Sangeetha Weerarathna and her husband Roshantha Kariyapperuma.
The investigations into this arson attack on the Siyatha media group have been handed over to the Slave Island police but they have clearly failed to move in the matter so far.
Before this latest arson attack directed at Siyatha TV and Radio, there had been similar attacks launched at the Sirasa TV, another newspaper printing press and the Lanka newspaper office in the recent past. Now Siyatha TV and Radio has joined the list of media under seige, after an unidentified group had arrived in a vehicle and thrown petrol bombs at the broadcast station of this media outlet, early moning, July 30.
This unidentified group which had comprised of around 12 individuals had first attacked a security officer at the main gate before proceeding to accost two persons on the night news shift (Bharathi Rajinikanth and Lenin Raj) and then had destroyed the Siyatha TV programme division with petrol bombs.
The first building which came under attack had not suffered much damage but two of the storeys in the second building where Siyatha TV was operating had been badly damaged with the library, operational section, cassettes and cameras being destroyed in the process.
The administration department had also suffered severe damage. Speaking to this newspaper Siyatha news manager Udithamal Hemachandra said that as a result of the arson attack the TV station would not be able to restore its transmission, but insisted that the three radio channels were functioning as of now.
Police media spokesman Prishantha Jayakody pointed out that the police department had taken steps to immediately send a team from Slave Island to the location no sooner than they had received a call to police emergency number 119 — and furthermore had taken measures to send a squad from the fire brigade to douse the fire.
However, the Director General of the National Security Centre Lakshman Hulugalle insisted that there was clearly a conspiracy behind this arson attack on Siyatha TV.
Several media organizations have issued statements condemning the attack on Siyatha TV with most of them being of the opinion that while it is the onerous duty of all media in this country to stick to accepted norms and principles of the profession, that there were certain quarters which are still looking with jaundiced eyes and with vengeance in their heart at certain media institutions, which do not conform to their views.http://www.lakbimanews.lk/news/laknew4.htm

3.Sri Lanka gets more Emirates flights to Male
Emirates is to increase the frequency of flights between Sri Lanka and the Maldives to cater to increasing tourist traffic, a statement said.
Emirates is to add three extra flights to Malé from August 1, resulting in the airline operating daily flights between Malé and Colombo and increasing its services from four to five flights a week.
The additional flights take Emirates’ services to the Maldives to 19 a week, making the Dubai-based airline one of the most active international carriers serving the country.
“As tourism and economies revive in the region, there is increasing demand for seats on the Malé-Colombo sector,” said Majid Al Mualla, Senior Vice President – Commercial Operations West Asia & Indian Ocean.
Emirates flights EK652 and EK 654 will depart Malé at 16:30 and arrive in Colombo at 18:30. On Wednesdays and Fridays, EK654 will continue on to Dubai from Colombo.
The return flight EK653 – operating on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday – will depart Colombo at 21:35 and arrive in Malé at 22:35.
These flights will be served by Emirates’ Airbus A330-200 aircraft in a three-class configuration, with 12 seats in First Class, 42 seats in Business Class and 183 seats in Economy Class.
Emirates has served the Maldives since April 1987, and also operates 14 flights a week from Malé to Dubai, the airline’s home base. http://www.lankabusinessonline.com/fullstory.php?nid=2038469298

4.Broadband Internet users seen at 4 milion in 4 years
Colombo: Telecom and IT have driven growth in Sri Lanka, even during the war years with latest estimates of the broadband Internet market seeing it expanding to 4.3 million users in the next four year from around 330,000 now, according to a research study.
According to the report on the Sri Lankan telecom industry by US-based Proactiveinvestors, a financial news and analysis provider, the broadband Internet market in Sri Lanka, though in its infancy with very low penetration levels, has the available technology which is on par with most developed nations, ranging from ADSL fixed wire-line services to Wi-Max fixed wireless broadband access, GPRS mobile telephony Internet to HSPA mobile broadband Internet connectivity.
“Currently, affordability/lower disposable incomes are the main constraints to expansion in demand for broadband Internet connectivity in Sri Lanka. In addition to the initial cost of acquiring the connection and the monthly subscription charge, a computer, which is relatively new and therefore expensive is also needed to derive the optimum benefits of broadband Internet access. Such outlay still remains beyond the reach of most households/individuals in Sri Lanka,&
rdquo; it said.http://www.sundaytimes.lk/100801/BusinessTimes/bt16.html