Australia's cricket team is on a six-week tour of Sri Lanka. But the situation is so bad on the island that few can watch the matches on their TVs because the country is plagued by power outages.
As 35,000 spectators in Colombo's largest stadium watched Australia's T20 cricket matches against Sri Lanka, they were treated to a rare sight: The lights stayed on for more than three hours.
For most Sri Lankans, the only way to watch the matches is to attend them because regular power outages knock out their televisions. Australia T20 captain Aaron Finch said players had since been assured by Sri Lanka's cricket board that the tour should go ahead after extensive diplomatic talks."There've been a lot of meetings between the Australian government, the High Commission, DFAT, Cricket Australia, and Sri Lanka Cricket," he told the ABC.
"I was at the fuel queue for a couple of hours and here in the cricket tickets queue for 30 minutes."As protests continue in Sri Lanka every day calling for political change and an end to the crisis, the government is trying to get at least $6 billion in foreign aid to bring back services. "Life has been difficult during the economic crisis, we haven't had any business and we're in debt to most people.Protests during the crisis have been largely peaceful but last month, security forces were ordered by the defence ministry to shoot protesters causing injury to people or property.Posts started going viral on social media claiming that military law prevented soldiers from shooting at demonstrators holding the national flag.
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