The World - News from Nov. 18, 1987

Sri Lanka’s finance minister, R. J. G. de Mel, proposed tax cuts on personal income and tea exports but set higher rates for liquor, beer and lipstick in a package of reforms presented to Parliament to rebuild the island’s war-shattered economy. De Mel also proposed raising salaries of civil servants. The finance minister said that an India-brokered peace accord aimed at ending a four-year war against separatist Tamil rebels will ease the financial strain on the Sri Lankan government, and he promised to put the island back on the road to development.