MEDIRIGIRIYA, Sri Lanka: When the decades-long civil war that forced Samantha Pushpakumara from his village in north-central Sri Lanka ended, he was finally able to return home to a life of farming that he thought would give his family a stable future. That was until the rains didn’t come.
Sri Lanka has been mired in drought for months, leading to severe water shortages that have left reservoirs dry and strained farming communities that depend on seasonal monsoons.