Sri Lanka proposes privatizing national airline amid crisis

Sri Lanka’s new prime minister wants to privatize the country’s loss-making national airline as part of reforms aimed at solving the country worst economic crisis in decades

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka -- Sri Lanka’s new prime minister on Monday proposed privatizing the country’s loss-making national airline as part of reforms aimed at solving the country worst economic crisis in decades.

Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe said in a message to the people that he plans to propose a special relief budget that will take the place of the development-oriented budget earlier approved for this year, He said it would channel funds previously allocated for infrastructure development to public welfare.

He said the country's financial health is so poor that the government has been forced to print money to pay the salaries of government workers and buy other goods and services.

President Gotabaya Rajapaksa appointed Wickremesinghe as prime minister last Thursday in a bid to quell the island nation’s political and economic crisis.