COLOMBO: Sri Lanka's leading presidential candidate and Marxist leader Anura Kumara Dissanayaka's party has said that it will not scrap the country's $2.9 billion International Monetary Fund

Sri Lanka’s president said reopening talks with the International Monetary Fund over a bailout program would represent the biggest threat to the island nation’s economy, hitting back at his opponents who have pledged fresh dialogue with the lender.

Sri Lanka’s leftist candidate won a tightly contested presidential election, with voters sweeping out the incumbent for the economic pain they’ve endured in the two years since the country was plunged into crisis.