Australia pledges assistance for strategic investment, education promotion in Sri Lanka

Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa on Monday said that Australia has pledged assistance for strategic investments and promotion in the education sector in the island nation.

This comes after Australian High Commissioner to Sri Lanka David Holly met President Gotabhaya Rajapaksa at the Presidential Secretariat on Monday.

"Further the Australian High Commissioner pledged assistance for strategic investments & education sector promotion in Sri Lanka. Attention was drawn on the potential of positioning Sri Lanka as a preferred destination for higher education in the South Asian region," Gotabaya Rajapaksa wrote in a tweet.

Talking about the damage caused by the fire that erupted in the vessel MV X-Press Pearl in the Sri Lankan water, President Rajapaksa said he was seeking technical assistance from the Australian government to mitigate the environmental damage caused by ship.

"Assistance to assess & mitigate the environmental damage caused by recent vessel accidents in Sri Lankan waters & a future organic fertilizer driven agriculture program was discussed in today's highly productive meeting with the Australian High Commissioner to #lka David Holly," he tweeted.

The distressed vessel MV X-Press Pearl was carrying 1,486 containers with nitric acid and other hazardous IMDG code chemicals. The extreme fire, damage to containers and prevailing inclement weather caused the vessel to tilt to starboard resulting in the falling of containers overboard.

( With inputs from ANI )

Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor