Live
- Second phase randomization of EVMs is complete
- BJP confusing Matua voters though CAA notification: Mamata Banerjee
- IPL 2024: LSG might have to play the rest of the event without Mayank Yadav, says coach Justin Langer
- Two killed after colliding with a parked lorry
- PCB identifies the April 7- May 20 window for PSL 2025; to clash with IPL’s next season
- Viksit Bharat Ambassador event: Sri Sri Ravi Shankar heaps praise on PM Modi for Kashi facelift
- Women’s Hockey League: Haryana, Madhya Pradesh win on Day 5
- Indian Americans caution US university on demand to display 'flag of Kashmir'
- YS Sharmila worried over 'mental state' of brother Jagan
- PM Modi prays at Kanpur gurdwara along with CM Yogi
Sri Lanka: Muslims fear hate attacks
Highlights
Sri Lanka: Muslims fear hate attacks. Sri Lanka\'s Muslim legislators on Friday asked President Mahinda Rajapakse to protect their minority community from \"Buddhist extremist elements\" blamed for a recent spate of hate attacks.
COLOMBO: Sri Lanka's Muslim legislators on Friday asked President Mahinda Rajapakse to protect their minority community from "Buddhist extremist elements" blamed for a recent spate of hate attacks.
The Muslim Council of Sri Lanka, an umbrella organisation of Muslim groups, said 16 out of the 18 Muslim parliamentarians had asked the president to intervene and halt the attacks.
"Muslim parliamentarians wish to bring to your excellency's kind attention the continued hate campaign, intimidation and threats to Muslims, carried out by some Buddhist extremist elements," the MPs said in a joint letter.
It was sent after police on Monday established a new unit to investigate hate crimes after attacks by Buddhist monks on churches and mosques last year raised concerns about religious freedom.
Nationalist Buddhist groups have accused religious minorities of having undue political and economic influence on the island.
Videos posted on YouTube have shown mobs led by Buddhist monks throwing stones and smashing a Christian prayer centre in southern Sri Lanka in January this year and attacking mosques while police looked on.
Senior Buddhist monks have also been caught on video threatening violence against their moderate colleagues who advocate tolerance.
The country is emerging from nearly four decades of ethnic war which according to UN estimates claimed at least 100,000 lives between 1972 and 2009.
Tamil rebels were fighting for a separate homeland for ethnic minority Tamils, who are Hindu, on the Sinhalese-majority island.
Seventy percent of Sri Lanka's 20 million people are Sinhalese Buddhists, while Muslims are the second-largest religious group, making up just under 10 percent.
Rajapakse, who is a Buddhist, warned monks in January last year not to incite religious violence.
However, police broke up a protest denouncing religious extremism last year, sparking opposition allegations that the government was tacitly supporting the violence.
Next Story
ADVERTISEMENT
