Sri Lanka Economic Crisis Live Updates: Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa declared a nationwide public emergency late on Friday following violent protests over the country’s worst economic crisis in decades. The President invoked the tough laws allowing the military to arrest and detain suspects for long periods without trial as demonstrations calling for his ouster spread across the South Asian nation.
Anger against Rajapaksa’s handling of a deepening economic crisis in the island nation of 22 million people spiralled into violence late on Thursday, as hundreds of protesters clashed with police for several hours. A severe shortage of foreign currency has left Rajapaksa’s government unable to pay for essential imports, including fuel, leading to debilitating power cuts lasting up to 13 hours.
On a three-day visit to Delhi, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin Thursday met PM Narendra Modi and urged the Centre to allow the state government to provide humanitarian aid to Sri Lankan Tamils. He said many of them are fleeing Lanka and coming to the state through the sea route in the wake of the economic crisis in the island-nation.