COLOMBO: Sri Lanka's president has revealed that she privately underwent a second swearing-in ceremony a year after she last took office, and claims this entitles her to stay in the post for an additional year, until 2006, further complicating the island's political crisis.
President Chandrika Kumaratunga's stunning revelation on Tuesday came amid a bitter power struggle with her political rival, the separately elected Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, who made no immediate comment.