Sri lanka cuts bank taxes but hikes tax on stock trading

Sri Lanka has cut a series of taxes on banks in a bid to increase banking activities, but raised a tax on stock trading, President Mahinda Rajapaksa said presenting the budget for 2011 in parliament.

A debit tax on withdrawals from banks would be lifted and a so-called financial value added tax would be cut from 20 to 12 per cent, Rajapaksa said. 

Sri Lanka overhauls telecom taxes

Sri Lanka has changed the taxes for telecommunications services and also imposed regulatory licence fee of 2 percent of revenues. While high tech telecommunications equipment imports will not be charged VAT, the government has imposed a LKR 2 per minute tax on outgoing calls. The 20 percent tax replaces the VAT, a mobile subscriber levy, and an economic service charge, The Lanka Business Online reports. 

Deepa Mehta to shoot Midnight's Children in Sri Lanka

Oscar nominated director Deepa Mehta and multi-award-winning author Salman Rushdie's screen adaptation of his extraordinary multi award-winning international bestselling novel Midnight's Children will commence shooting in Sri Lanka in January 2011.

Shabana Azmi, Irrfan Khan, Soha Ali Khan, Nandita Das, Chandan Roy Sanyal and Seema Biswas will star in the English language film.

Facebook to add own e-mail service - report

Facebook is expected to unveil a revamped set of communications services that will include an e-mail system in which users will have addresses with the facebook.com suffix, two people briefed on Facebook's plans told the New York Times. Facebook has invited reporters to a press conference on 15 November, but has refused to say what it plans to announce. The company declined to comment on any unannounced communications services.

West cannot defeat al-Qaeda, says UK forces chief

The West can only contain, not defeat, militant groups such as al-Qaeda, the head of the UK's armed forces has said. General Sir David Richards, a former Nato commander in Afghanistan, said Islamist militancy would pose a threat to the UK for at least 30 years.

But he told the BBC's Andrew Marr Show a clear-cut victory over militants was not achievable. The BBC's Frank Gardner said the comments reflect a "new realism" in UK and US counter-terrorism circles.