COLOMBO, April 3 (Reuters) – Police fired tear gas at tons of of protesting college students in central Sri Lanka on Sunday, a federal lawmaker mentioned, as troopers manned checkpoints within the capital to implement a curfew imposed to curb public outrage triggered by an financial disaster.
Lakshman Kiriella, MP from the second-largest metropolis, Kandy, mentioned police used tear gas to scatter college students protesting in opposition to the federal government close to the University of Peradeniya.
“These students have come out in defiance of the curfew and police have fired tear gas to disperse them,” mentioned Kiriella, from the opposition Samagi Jana Balawegaya occasion. The college is on the outskirts of Kandy, the place the scholars had been held again by police, he mentioned.
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Police officers in Kandy didn’t reply to calls from Reuters in search of remark.
President Gotabaya Rajapaksa declared a state of emergency on Friday because the Indian Ocean island nation grapples with rising costs, shortages of necessities and rolling energy cuts. On Saturday, the federal government carried out a national curfew as protests turned violent. It is to run till until 6 a.m. (0030 GMT) on Monday. learn extra
Critics say the roots of the disaster, the worst in a number of many years, lie in financial mismanagement by successive governments that amassed large finances shortfalls and a present account deficit.
The disaster was accelerated by deep tax cuts Rajapaksa promised throughout the 2019 election marketing campaign and enacted months earlier than the COVID-19 pandemic, which worn out elements of Sri Lanka’s economic system.
SOCIAL MEDIA RESTORED
In the capital Colombo on Sunday, some two dozen opposition leaders stopped at police barricades on the way in which to Independence Square, some shouting “Gota(baya) Go Home”.
“This is unacceptable,” mentioned opposition chief Eran Wickramaratne leaning over the barricades. “This is a democracy.”
Small teams in Colombo had been standing outdoors their properties to protest, some holding handwritten banners, others with nationwide flags.
In the afternoon the federal government lifted a block it had positioned on social media platforms hours earlier. Access to Twitter, Facebook, WhatsApp, YouTube and Instagram had been blocked nationwide, mentioned web monitoring organisation NetBlocks.
Minister for Youth and Sports Namal Rajapaksa, the president’s nephew, mentioned in a tweet he would “never condone the blocking of social media”.
Emergency powers previously have allowed the navy to arrest and detain suspects with out warrants, however the phrases of the present powers are usually not but clear.
Soldiers with assault rifles and police manned checkpoints in Colombo on Sunday.
Nihal Thalduwa, a senior superintendent of police, mentioned 664 individuals who broke curfew guidelines had been arrested by the police within the Western Province, the nation’s most populous administrative division, which incorporates Colombo.
Western and Asian diplomats based mostly in Sri Lanka mentioned they had been monitoring the state of affairs and anticipated the federal government to enable residents to maintain peaceable demonstrations.
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Writing by Rupam Jain; Editing by Jacqueline Wong and William Mallard
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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