Sri Lanka pledges 5 Million US dollars to COVID-19 SAARC emergency fund

Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has pledged 5 Million US dollars to the COVID-19 emergency fund, set up by Prime minister Narendra Modi during his video conferencing with SAARC leaders to tackle COVID-19.

A statement issued by President office said Prime Minister Modi proposed the emergency fund as a security blanket for the SAARC countries.

It said this is a fund for the SAARC countries to draw from to deal with issues related to COVID-19. The statement said at the time of the conference, most SAARC countries had managed to keep the number of infected to lower levels of two digit numbers with Sri Lanka having only 11 confirmed cases.

It added that the economies of each SAARC member is being severely affected due to the strict measures each country had to adapt to keep the virus at bay. Sri Lanka has 87 confirmed cases so far and government has ordered a countrywide curfew since Friday.