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Govt. justifies political appointments in SL missions

19 Nov 2015 - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Though the new government recalled all politically appointed heads and senior officials of Sri Lankan missions overseas back to the country, the government had not said it would not make political appointments in the future, the Foreign Ministry said on Thursday.

Responding to a question that eight out of the new 13 Sri Lankan heads of missions appointed by the Ministry were political appointments, Ministry Spokesperson Mahishini Colonne said the government had never said that no further political appointments would be made.

“We have to resort to suitable and senior officials who didn’t belong to the Foreign Service to serve in Sri Lankan missions overseas as the Ministry doesn’t have a sufficient number of senior officials to both serve in the ministry and embassies at a given time. Therefore, we have to balance that void. Appointing officials out of the Foreign Service is not something new and practice only in Sri Lanka. Even the US does that,” she told a news conference.

The Ministry today announced the names of 13 heads of missions appointed to Sri Lankan embassies and high commissions overseas. Accordingly, new ambassadors were appointed to Austria, China, Indonesia, Italy, Jordan, Myanmar, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Africa, Turkey and United Arab Emirates. Mr. Wadiwel Krishnamurthi was appointed as the Deputy High Commissioner to Shanghai.

Former Minister Dr. Karunasena Kodithuwakku was appointed ambassador to China, Darshana Perera to Indonesia and Priyani Wijesekara to Austria.

D.S.L. Pelpola was appointed as the Ambassador to Italy, A.L.M. Lafeer to Jordan, K.W.M.D. Karunaratne to Myanmar, A.M. Thaseem to Saudi Arabia, Sunil De Silva to South Africa, S.J. Mohideen to UAE, M.S. Anwar to Palestine, Nimal Weeraratna to Singapore and C.M. Anzar to Turkey. (Lahiru Pothmulla)

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Govt. justifies political appointments in SL missions

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