Born on March 24, 1949, Ranil Wickremesinghe is the leader of the United National Party. He is a LLB graduate of University of Colombo and was elected to parliament from the Biyagama electorate in 1977. After the assassination of President R Premadasa, he was appointed Prime Minister by the new president DB Wijetunge. He lost the post after the defeat of the UNP in August 1994 General Election. He was later Prime Monister from December 2001 to April 2004 and signed a controversial ceasefire with the LTTE during his tenure.