Sri Lanka has closed schools in its capital, Colombo, and its suburbs as heavy rains triggered floods in many parts of the island nation.

Sri Lanka’s new President Anura Kumara Dissanayake says that he will soon resume discussions with the International Monetary Fund and foreign creditors to plot a way out of the worst economic crisis in the country’s history.

A union strike launched by railway employees has stopped trains across Sri Lanka.

Sri Lanka has closed schools as heavy rain triggered floods and mudslides in many parts of the island nation, leaving at least 16 people dead.

Scientists calculate that for the ninth straight month Earth has obliterated global heat records.

The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization has set a target to further increase aquaculture production to meet rising demand for seafood and to fight global hunger and undernourishment.

The International Monetary Fund executive board has approved the release of the second tranche of a bailout package to help Sri Lanka recover from the worst economic crisis in its history.

Sri Lanka says it has reached an agreement in principle with a group of creditors including India and Japan on debt restructuring.

The U.S. plans to launch a $553 million project to build a deep-water shipping container terminal in Sri Lanka as it competes with China in development financing.

China’s Belt and Road Initiative looks to become smaller and greener after a decade of big projects that boosted trade but left big debts and raised environmental concerns.

Dallas, Florida and New York will host matches at next year's men’s T20 World Cup.

Sri Lanka's government has deployed army troops at railroad stations as railway employees continued with their strike.

Cricket, breakdancing and flag football are still waiting to find out if they will be added to the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.

Sri Lanka's foreign minister says his country welcomes the Netherlands' plan to return a bejeweled ceremonial cannon and other colonial-era artifacts from the Netherlands and is working through how to preserve the items.

China has expressed support for Sri Lanka ahead of a meeting of lenders to poor economies but gave no indication if it might help to cut debts that have plunged the Indian Ocean island nation into financial and political turmoil.

Sri Lanka’s Supreme Court has ruled that inaction by the country’s former president and four others led to Easter Sunday bomb attacks in 2019 that killed nearly 270 people and ordered them to pay compensation for violating the basic rights of the victims and their families.

Sri Lanka’s government has started debt restructuring discussions with China, an important step toward finalizing an International Monetary Fund rescue of the island nation from its worst economic crisis.

Most Asian countries are prioritizing keeping the country running, no matter the energy source.

American authors Elizabeth Strout and Percival Everett are up against writers from Britain, Ireland, Zimbabwe and Sri Lanka as finalists for the prestigious Booker Prize for fiction.

Sri Lanka’s ousted President Gotabaya Rajapaksa could face legal action over forced disappearances of activists now that he has been stripped of constitutional immunity following his return home.

The International Monetary Fund says it has reached a preliminary agreement to provide $2.9 billion over four years to help crisis-hit Sri Lanka.

The head of the U.S. government aid agency has called on China to help Sri Lanka and other nations that had borrowed heavily from Beijing with debt restructuring, not just with lines of credit and emergency loans.

Sri Lanka's prime minister has been elected president by lawmakers who opted for a seasoned, veteran leader to lead the country out of economic collapse.

Sri Lanka’s prime minister and acting president Ranil Wickremesinghe faces two rivals in a parliamentary vote on who will succeed the ousted leader who fled the country last week.

What the future holds for the country remains in light of the turmoil remains to be seen, but the images of the people’s anger have sure been striking lately.

A political vacuum continues in Sri Lanka with opposition leaders yet to agree on who should replace its roundly rejected leaders, whose residences are occupied by protesters angry over the country’s deep economic woes.

Sri Lanka is desperate for help to weather its worst crisis in recent memory, but it’s not the only economy that’s in serious trouble as prices of food, fuel and other staples soar, partly due to the war in Ukraine.

Sri Lanka’s debt-laden economy has “collapsed” after months of shortages of food, fuel and electricity.

Sri Lanka’s prime minister says he may be compelled to buy more oil from Russia as he hunts desperately for fuel to keep the country running.

Police have used tear gas and a water canon to disperse demonstrators trying to approach Sri Lanka’s president’s office to demand his resignation over the country’s economic crisis.

Sri Lanka’s president says his government is in discussions with the International Monetary Fund, other agencies and countries on deferring loan repayments.

Conservationists and veterinarians are warning that plastic waste in an open landfill in eastern Sri Lanka is killing elephants, after two more were found dead over the weekend.

A gem company in Sri Lanka has unveiled a rare and massive gemstone weighing 683 pounds (310 kilograms) that has been certified as one of the biggest corundums ever found in the country.

The Pittsburgh Buddhist Center had a problem: Its fiberglass Buddha statue was deteriorating after 15 years outdoors.

David Miller hit two sixes in the last over as South Africa shrugged off a hat trick from Wanindu Hasaranga to beat Sri Lanka by four wickets at the T20 World Cup.

Quinton de Kock has returned to South Africa’s team for the T20 World Cup game against Sri Lanka in Sharjah.

The mother of an Islamic State-inspired extremist who stabbed shoppers in a New Zealand supermarket said her son was radicalized by neighbors from Syria and Iraq.

The chairman of one of South Korea’s biggest dairy companies has resigned over a scandal in which his company was accused of deliberately spreading misinformation that its yogurt helps prevent coronavirus infections.

Brian Kemp said all Georgians 16 and older will be eligible to receive the COVID-19 vaccine. Greg Abbott said Thursday that he’s hoping to increase the number of Texans getting COVID-19 vaccines after seeing a drop in people showing up for the shot. That’s a big jump from the roughly 1.8 million doses a week the state is currently getting. ___PHOENIX — Arizona on Thursday reported 138 confirmed coronavirus cases, the smallest daily increase reported in more than six months. The U.K. says its vaccination program has given at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine to more than half the adult population.

(AP Photo/Christophe Ena)LONDON — Ireland has given out half a million coronavirus vaccinations about two months after the first inoculation. Evidence suggests this variant can spread more easily than most currently circulating strains of the coronavirus, health officials say. State health officials urge people to maintain precautions, particularly during spring break and Easter gatherings, as the state tries to ramp up vaccinations. Sri Lanka has so far received 1 million doses of Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines manufactured in neighboring India, which donated half of the doses. The Missoulian reported Friday that in Missoula County, Granite Pharmacy has enough vaccine doses to vaccinate all 2,000 county teachers.

(AP Photo/Gregory Bull, File)SAN DIEGO -- The San Diego Zoo has vaccinated nine great apes for the coronavirus after a troop of gorillas in its Safari Park became infected. AdThere have been no new community cases of the virus found in Auckland or elsewhere in New Zealand for the past five days. Ad___SALT LAKE CITY -- Utah will open up COVID-19 vaccine appointments to people ages 50 and older on Monday. ___JACKSON, Miss.-- People ages 50 and older in Mississippi are now eligible to receive the coronavirus vaccine, Gov. — Arkansas’ highest court and the governor are at odds over whether judges, prosecutors and other court employees should be immediately eligible for the coronavirus vaccine.

MIAMI – Sri Kajamukam Chelliah met with migrants from Sri Lanka in Haiti, and traveled by boat with them to Turks and Caicos Islands, the Bahamas, and to Miami, federal authorities said. Chelliah, 55, also known as Richie, worked with human smugglers to arrange the migrants’ stay at a hotel in Port-au-Prince, and to board a sloop sailboat with about 154 migrants, prosecutors said. Chelliah, a Canadian national, served a year in prison in Turks and Caicos. Acting Assistant Attorney General Nicholas L. McQuaid released a statement accusing Chelliah of jeopardizing national security for financial gain. AdHomeland Security Investigations Miami investigated the case with the help of HSI Human Smuggling Unit and U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

Wayne Pollard receives a COVID-19 vaccine at the Martin Luther King Senior Center, Wednesday, Feb. 10, 2021, in North Las Vegas. (AP Photo/John Locher)RENO, Nev. — Nevada health officials have confirmed the state’s first known case of a coronavirus variant that was originally identified in South Africa. AdNevada has also reported six known cases of a more contagious coronavirus variant that first originated in the United Kingdom. ___ALGIERS, Algeria — President Abdelmadjid Tebboune says Algeria will start producing Russia’s Sputnik-V coronavirus vaccine in six or seven months. ___CARSON CITY, Nevada — Health officials have confirmed the first known case in Nevada of a coronavirus variant that was first identified in South Africa.

A member of the medical staff administrates the AstraZeneca-Oxford COVID-19 vaccine to a colleague at the South Ile-de-France Hospital Group in Melun, in the outskirts of Paris, Monday Feb. 8, 2021. The state’s top public health officials said Monday that the vaccination is supposed to be limited to Mississippi residents, or to people from other states who work in Mississippi. The change means as many as 1.5 million people in the state now qualify for shots, up from about 700,000. Ad___PORTLAND, Ore. — Appointments to receive the coronavirus vaccine in Oregon have been quickly booked as residents who are 80 years and older are now eligible to receive doses. Seniors in Oregon have waited weeks to receive the vaccine, after the original eligibility date was delayed and then Gov.

(AP Photo/Aaron Favila)COLOMBO – Sri Lanka on Friday began inoculating front-line health workers, military troops and police officers against COVID-19 amid warnings about infections among medical workers. The government says 150,000 health workers and 115,000 selected military and police will be the first recipients. The health ministry said it will expand to other parts of the country by next week. AdMost of Sri Lanka's COVID-19 cases and deaths have occurred since October when clusters centered on a garment factory and a fish market emerged in the capital Colombo and its suburbs. The health ministry said more than 113,000 people had received their first dose of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine and 432 of them reported side effects.

State health officials said Tuesday that the variant was found in a man in his 20s who is in isolation southeast of Denver and has no travel history. Health officials have said the vaccines being given now are thought to be effective against the variant. — A former Louisiana state lawmaker and his wife died from COVID-19 on the same day. ___OKLAHOMA CITY — The Oklahoma City fire department says a firefighter, whose nephew became the first department employee to receive the COVID-19 vaccine, died of the virus after being infected while responding to a call. In the Upstate area of the state, COVID-19 infection rates continue to outpace every other part of South Carolina.

SEOUL – Authorities in the South Korean capital on Monday announced a tightening of social distancing regulations, including shutting nightclubs, limiting service hours at restaurants and reducing public transportation. South Korea has saw the virus spread faster after authorities eased social distancing restrictions to the lowest level in October amid concerns about a weak economy. Many experts and government officials have warned that the chance of the virus spreading will be greater during the cold weather. The Health Ministry reported 4,442 new cases on Monday to bring the country’s total to 502,110, the highest toll in Southeast Asia and second in Asia only to India’s more than 9.1 million confirmed cases. India has reported more than 9 million cases since the pandemic began, second behind the United States.

(AP Photo/Andy Wong)COLOMBO – Melbourne, Australia’s former coronavirus hot spot, will largely emerge from a lockdown after the nation’s second-largest city on Monday recorded its first day without a new coronavirus case in more than four months. At midnight on Nov. 8, Melbourne residents will no longer be restricted to traveling within 25 kilometers (16 miles) of their homes. Melbourne has been under strict lockdown measures since early July, and the state government has been accused of inflicting unnecessary economic damage by not relaxing restrictions sooner. One fatality was reported on Sunday, raising Sri Lanka’s death toll to 16. The Health Ministry said that 45,148 new cases raised the country's overall toll to over 7.9 million.

(AP Photo/Eranga Jayawardena)COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — Authorities in Sri Lanka have closed the country’s main fish market and widened the curfew in many parts of the island nation following a surge of coronavirus infections related to a new cluster centered on a garment factory. — Boston schools will switch to all-remote learning in response to rising coronavirus cases in the city. Kelly said Wednesday that two-thirds of the state’s confirmed cases now are outside the Wichita and Kansas City region. On Wednesday, the state reported its first patient to the field hospital on the state fairgrounds in West Allis outside of Milwaukee. ___ROME — The Italian region of Lazio, which includes Rome, is imposing an overnight curfew to combat surging coronavirus infections.

Employees of Colombo municipal council crowd around a table to give their swab samples to test for COVID-19 in Colombo, Sri Lanka, Wednesday, Oct. 7, 2020. Authorities in Sri Lanka on Wednesday widened a curfew and warned of legal action against those evading treatment for COVID-19 after reporting an escalating cluster centered around a garment factory in the capital's suburbs. (AP Photo/Eranga Jayawardena)COLOMBO – Authorities in Sri Lanka on Wednesday widened a curfew and warned of legal action against those evading treatment for COVID-19 after reporting a growing cluster centered around a garment factory in the capital's suburbs. The new cluster at the garment factory is the biggest reported in Sri Lanka. Local media reported that police and health workers were visiting the homes of factory workers on leave and were testing them as well.

The health ministry said 321 cases have been identified in the factory cluster after the first patient was diagnosed at a hospital two days ago. The last three weeks have seen a gradual decline in its reported infections. — South Korea has reported 75 new cases of the coronavirus as infections steadily rise in the greater capital area. — Japan and South Korea have agreed to resume business travel between them starting Oct. 8, according to the Japanese Foreign Ministry. South Korea has reported slightly more than 400 deaths from the coronavirus, while Japan has confirmed about 1,600.

Animal rights campaigners have called on tourists in Sri Lanka to boycott elephant attractions after photographs of a malnourished female used in a festival were circulated online. (CNN) - An elephant from Sri Lanka whose skeletal appearance led to a global outcry has died, the animal rights charity that exposed its condition says. Images of the emaciated elephant were shared in August by the Thai-based Save Elephant Foundation (SEF) to raise awareness of the exploitation of elephants in captivity. After the outrage sparked by her appearance, the festival organizers decided to withdraw her from this year's closing parade. She told CNN that she learned of the death from contacts in Sri Lanka.

Ian Walton/Getty Images(CNN) - At least 17 people were injured after two elephants became restless and stampeded down a street during a religious parade in Sri Lanka. The elephants were part of the procession when one got distressed and began to get restless, according to local news source Adaderana. Then the second elephant began to exhibit signs of restlessness after seeing the first in distress. According to the news source, twelve of the seventeen people injured are women. The parade is an annual Buddhist processional that marks important moments in Buddha's life, and its ceremonies are known for being elaborate and highly decorated.

(CNN) - Sri Lanka has defied the global trend in the battle against measles, with the country declared free of the highly infectious disease by the World Health Organization on Tuesday. Sporadic cases reported in the last three years were imported from abroad but were quickly detected, investigated and received a rapid response, WHO added. This year, the United States, where measles was declared eliminated in 2000, has experienced the highest number of measles cases since 1992. However, the global health body said that Sri Lanka would have to remain vigilant to keep its measles-free status. "The risk of importations of measles virus from countries near and far will remain, specially from those that have significant population movement with Sri Lanka," Singh said.