SRI LANKA LIFTS NATIONWIDE STATE OF EMERGENCY
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| Sri Lanka's President Maithripala Sirisena |
Sri Lanka President
Maithripala Sirisena said on Sunday he had lifted a nationwide state of
emergency imposed on March 6 after Buddhist-Muslim clashes.
“Upon assessing the
public safety situation, I instructed to revoke the State of Emergency from
midnight yesterday,” Sirisena said on his Twitter feed.
He declared a state
of emergency to rein in the spread of communal violence after Buddhists and
Muslims clashed in the Indian Ocean island’s central district of Kandy.
Two people were
killed and hundreds of Muslim-owned properties and more than 20 mosques were
damaged, media reported.
Tension has been
growing between the two communities over the past year, with some hardline
Buddhist groups accusing Muslims of forcing people to convert to Islam and
vandalising Buddhist archaeological sites.
Some Buddhist
nationalists have also protested against the presence in Sri Lanka of Muslim
Rohingya asylum-seekers from mostly Buddhist Myanmar, where Buddhist
nationalism has also been on the rise.
SOURCE: REUTERS
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