The UK Minister for Asia, Hugo Swire, will visit Colombo, Jaffna and Galle in his third official visit to Sri Lanka.

The visit is the latest in a series of high level engagements between the governments of the United Kingdom and Sri Lanka over the last year. Relations between the two countries have been reinvigorated since the election of President Sirisena in January 2015.

Swire will welcome the Sri Lankan government’s commitment to reconciliation and strengthening democracy since the end of its civil war, as well as progress made so far. His discussions will focus on further developing cooperation between the two countries and on UK support for Sri Lankan efforts to tackle the legacy of the conflict.

During his three-day visit, Swire will meet President Maithripala Sirisena, Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera and a number of other Ministers.

The Minister will also visit Jaffna where he will meet the Chief Minister of the Northern Provincial Council C.V. Wigneswaran and be a guest of the PM at the National Thai Pongal celebrations.

Swire will meet families living on land cleared from mines thanks to HALO Trust – a British demining charity – who have now removed 200,000 mines to make land safe for resettling displaced people.

He will finish his visit to Sri Lanka in Galle where he will attend the Literary Festival.

(gov.uk)