COLOMBO, July 3 -- Sri Lanka's reclassification by the World Bank as an upper-middle-income country masks the country's worsening social and economic reality, with poverty having doubled since 2019 despite the improved income status, opposition MP Harsha de Silva said.

Responding to media queries on the World Bank's latest country income classification, the Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) parliamentarian said Sri Lanka had regained upper-middle-income status primarily because its Gross National Income (GNI) in US dollar terms exceeded the World Bank's threshold, rather than as a result of broad-based economic growth.

De Silva said the improvement was driven largely by the appreciation of the Sri Lankan rupee against the US dollar, which st...