https://www.scmp.com/rss/326272/feed en https://assets.i-scmp.com/static/img/icons/scmp-meta-1200x630.png https://www.scmp.com Just before being hauled off to jail, the seemingly untouchable firebrand monk – clad in a brilliant saffron robe – wanted to get in the last word. “I have done my duty towards the country,” Galagoda Aththe Gnanasara told reporters early this month as he boarded a prison transport vehicle shortly after his sentencing in a Colombo courtroom. “Why should I regret?” While the controversial monk expressed no remorse, his many critics were cautiously hopeful that his internment showed Buddhist... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/2152088/buddhist-extremism-monk-gnanasaras-jailing-sign-sri-lankan?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/2152088/buddhist-extremism-monk-gnanasaras-jailing-sign-sri-lankan?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 24 Jun 2018 06:30:29 +0000 Even in ultra-conservative Saudi Arabia, women will finally get the right to drive cars this year. Compare that to Sri Lanka, where women recently won the right to buy a drink at a bar – or rather had won it, until it was revoked just days later. “When the world is going one way, Sri Lanka is running a race to the bottom,” Thyagi Ruwanpathirana, a human-rights activist based in Colombo, said. The Sri Lankan Finance Ministry announced in mid-January that it would lift a decades-old ban on women... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/2129652/gone-shot-why-did-sri-lanka-reinstate-alcohol-ban-women?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/2129652/gone-shot-why-did-sri-lanka-reinstate-alcohol-ban-women?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 20 Jan 2018 02:46:30 +0000