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Dr. Kohona calls for the revival of the Fa Xian spirit

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Sri Lankan ambassador to China – Dr. Palitha Kohona has said that Sri Lanka was ready to welcome Chinese travellers in the same spirit as it had welcomed Fa Xian 1600 years ago.

Dr. Kohona was the chief guest speaker at the 1689th birth anniversary celebration of monk Fa Xian at the city of Linfen in Shanxi.

While marveling at the incredibly arduous journey undertaken by Fa Xian, he welcomed the revival of the spirit of adventure, travel and discovery by today’s inheritors of the Fa Xian tradition.

Dr. Kohona shared the same thoughts at a meeting with the Secretary of the Party Leadership Committee, Hao Zhong Xiang.

Fa Xian was born in Linfen and Linfen hosts an elaborate Fa Xian (Pa Hien) memorial. He started his epic journey in search of the original Vinaya (discipline) texts of the order of Buddhist monks at the age of 65. He learned Sanskrit at 70 in order master the texts available in India. After crossing the scorching Gobi Desert and traversing the daunting Hindu Kush mountains on foot, he reached Taxila. In India, he acquired the texts that he wanted and visited the holy places of Buddhism. Given Lanka’s reputation as a centre of Buddhist learning, he traveled to the “Lion Kingdom” by sea. After spending two years in the Lankan capital, Anuradhapura at the Abhayagiri Monastery, he returned to his homeland at the age of 79 via Java with his precious collection of Buddhist texts. He wrote about his pioneering and daunting journey (Records of Buddhist Kingdoms) and translated the holy texts to Chinese. His influence on Chinese Buddhism is seminal.  Due to the impact Fa Xian’s journey had on opening up trade and travel routes, he could be described as an early pioneer of the BRI concept and globalisation.

Today, Linfen is priding itself as the birthplace of Fa Xian and may even be considering setting up an adventure travel option along the route taken by the indomitable Fa Xian.

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Cargills FoodCity assault : suspects released on bail

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The suspects recently remanded over assaulting a young woman at the Borella Cargills FoodCity supermarket, have been released on bail.

Colombo Additional Magistrate Sajindra Weerasuriya today (25) ordered to release the suspects on a surety of Rs. 5,000 each.

The suspects were produced before an identification parade and the complainant identifies 05 out of the 07 suspects.

Also, it was previously stated that the complainant had committed previous offences, it was singular that no such thing was mentioned in the police reports submitted to the court.

The court ordered to take up the case again on Nov. 08.

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Fmr. SDIG gets 5-yr. jail term

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The Ratnapura High Court has sentenced former Senior DIG Lalith Jayasinghe for five-year imprisonment for intimidating Kahawatte OIC not to arrest MP Premalal Jayasekera over a shooting incident.

Ratnapura High Court also ordered the convict to pay a fine of Rs. 20,000.

The shooting incident took place during the 2015 Presidential election campaign.

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Notice on issuing revenue licenses in WP

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The Department of Motor Traffic has decided to temporarily suspend the issuing of revenue licenses in the Western Province due to a system update.

According to the department, the services will be unavailable from this Wednesday (September 27) to next Monday (October 02). 

The Motor Traffic Department said in a statement that vehicles of which revenue licenses are expiring from Tuesday, September 26 can be renewed until October 10, without fines. 

Meanwhile, the online service for revenue licenses was temporarily suspended from midnight yesterday (September 24) and will remain so until Friday, October 06.

The department added that the temporary service suspension was due to an update on the system maintained by the Information and Communication Technology Agency of Sri Lanka.

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