Sri Lankan Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa yesterday resigned after dozens of people were hospitalized when his supporters, armed with sticks and clubs, attacked protesters.
The country has suffered months of blackouts and dire shortages of food, fuel and medicines in its worst economic crisis since independence, sparking weeks of overwhelmingly peaceful anti-government demonstrations.
Rajapaksa’s spokesman, Rohan Weliwita, said the 76-year-old sent his letter of resignation to his younger brother, Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, clearing the way for a “new unity government.”
Photo: AFP
“I am resigning with immediate effect so that you will be able to appoint an all-party government to guide the country out of the current economic crisis,” the prime minister said in the letter.
The nation’s largest opposition party had said before the clashes that it would not join any government helmed by a member of the Rajapaksa clan.
The resignation of the prime minister automatically means the Cabinet stands dissolved.
Yesterday, the biggest clashes since the start of the crisis erupted in Colombo when supporters of the Rajapaksa family went on the rampage, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reporters at the scene said.
Police fired tear gas and water cannon, and declared an immediate curfew in Colombo, which was later widened to include the entire South Asian island nation of 22 million people.
At least 78 people were hospitalized, Colombo National Hospital spokesman Pushpa Soysa said.
Officials said the army riot squad was called in to reinforce police. Soldiers have been deployed throughout the crisis to protect deliveries of fuel and other essentials, but until now not to prevent clashes.
Scores of Rajapaksa loyalists attacked unarmed protesters camping outside the president’s office at the sea-front Galle Face promenade in downtown Colombo since April 9, AFP reporters said.
The violence began after several thousand supporters of Mahinda Rajapaksa, bussed in from rural areas, poured out of his nearby official residence.
The prime minister had addressed about 3,000 supporters at his house and pledged he would “protect the interests of the nation.”
The supporters initially pulled down tents of protesters in front of the prime minister’s Temple Trees residence and torched anti-government banners and placards.
They then marched to the nearby promenade and began destroying other tents set up by the “Gota go home” campaign that demands the president step down.
“We were hit, the media were hit, women and children were hit,” one witness said, asking not to be named.
Opposition lawmaker Sajith Premadasa tried to move into the area after the clashes, but he came under attack from a mob and his security staff bundled him into a vehicle and drove off.
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