Pearl of the Indian Ocean

History and Culture
Sri Lanka’s history goes back nearly 3,500 years. Known as Lanka--the "resplendent land"--in the ancient Indian epic Ramayana, the island has numerous other references that testify to its natural beauty and wealth. Islamic folklore maintains that Adam and Eve were offered refuge on the island as solace for their expulsion from the Garden of Eden.

Asian poets, noting the geographical location of the island and lauding its beauty, called it the "pearl upon the brow of India." A troubled nation in the 1980s, torn apart by communal violence, Sri Lanka has more recently been called India's "fallen tear."

The country’s population is now 18 million. Like other South Asian countries, Sri Lanka has a diverse population in which various communities practice four of the world's major religions: Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, and Christianity. Sinhalese (74%) constitute the major ethnic group. Other ethnic groups are Tamil (18%), Moor Muslims (7%) while Burghers, Eurasians, Malay, Veddha together form 1% of the population.

The largest ethnic group is divided into low-country Sinhalese (subjected in coastal areas to greater colonial acculturation) and Kandyan Sinhalese (more traditional upland dwellers, named after Kingdom of Kandy, which resisted European encroachments until 1815-18). Tamils are divided into Sri LankanOnly 10% of the population speaks English in government and educated circles
Tamils (on island since early historic times) and Indian Tamils (brought in as plantation labour in the nineteenth century). The three national languages are Sinhala, Tamil and English, while the official languages are Tamil and Sinhala. Only 10% of the population speaks English in government and educated circles.

Geography
Sri Lanka is a pearl-shaped island 29 kilometers off the south-eastern coast of India. Rivers extend radially from central massif to coast; the longest is the Mahaweli Ganga (860 kilometers), which flows in northeasterly direction.

About 40 percent of island is forested and its coastline is regular but indented by numerous lagoons and marked by sandy beaches. Subject to southwest monsoon from mid May to October and northeast monsoon from December to March its rainfall is uneven. This also divides country climatically into the wet zone comprising southwestern quarter and dry zone on the rest of the island

Political
Sri Lanka is Asia’s oldest parliamentary democracySri Lanka is Asia’s oldest parliamentary democracy with universal suffrage for both men and women since 1931 and parliamentary government since independence from British rule in 1948. Successive governments have been freely elected with no instance of a military coup.

In the years since independence, Sri Lanka has experienced severe communal clashes between its Buddhist Sinhalese majority-- approximately 74 percent of the population--and the country's largest minority group, the Sri Lankan Tamils, who are Hindus and comprise nearly 13% of the population. Open violence broke out in 1983 in the form of an insurgency by the LTTE and other groups demanding a separate state of Tamil Eelam in the North and East provinces.

The communal violence that attracted the harsh scrutiny of the international media in the late 1980s can best be understood in the context of the island's complex historical development--its ancient and intricate relationship to the Indian civilization and its four centuries under colonial rule by European powers.

Various attempts at peace talks have failed in the past. Since December 2001 there has been a ceasefire with the Tamil separatist LTTE rebels and the Government of Sri Lanka. The talks are being held to reach an agreement on a federal system of government for the country.