Sri Lankan Mob Burns Muslim-owned Factory North Of Colombo
14 June 2019Islamophobia Reports
A mob set fire to a factory owned by a Muslim in Sri Lanka, another instance
of violence in a flare-up of anti-Muslim riots that have come in the wake of
the Easter Sunday bombings.
In footage published by the BBC on Tuesday, the factory, located in the
Minuwangoda town 35 kilometers (22 miles) northeast of the capital Colombo,
can be seen scorched with fire, while flames continue to burn at one end of
the building.
The incident comes one day after a 45-year-old Muslim man was killed by a
sword-wielding mob who attacked his carpentry shop in the Puttalam district.
Monday's riots prompted the government to impose another nationwide curfew and
temporarily block social media.
Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, the archbishop of Colombo, has condemned the
anti-Muslim attacks across the country and called for all ethnic and religious
groups to unite.
He told Muslims in Sri Lanka, "Do not be afraid of such malicious attacks and
be patient."
"We must build a new Sri Lanka, where all the races and religions live
together," Ranjith said, referring to the country's Tamil, Muslim, Christian,
Buddhist and Hindu populations.
He called the Easter attacks a "bad page" in Sri Lanka's history, pleading
with the nation to keep emotions in check and not let "the situation get out
of control."
Authorities have arrested 74 people, including three leaders of
non-governmental organizations, suspected of involvement in or incitement of
anti-Muslim attacks in Minuwango, Matara and Puttalam.
Tensions have been running high in the Buddhist-majority Indian Ocean island
nation since the April 21 attacks by seven suicide bombers who struck two
Catholic and one Protestant church and three luxury hotels. Daesh terror group
claimed responsibility for the attacks, carried out by a local terrorist
group.
Mosques and Muslim-owned properties in the country have been widely attacked,
especially by Sinhalese Buddhists. Sri Lanka's Muslims make up about 9% of its
population of 21 million people and mostly live in the east and center of the
island.
Sri Lanka has a dark history of communal tensions. For more than a quarter
century it was embroiled in civil war as Tamil Tiger rebels fought to create
an independent state for or ethnic minority Tamils. When the conflict ended 10
years ago the U.N.'s conservative estimates said about 100,000 people had been
killed.
Mob lynches Muslim man in Sri Lanka in first killing since Easter attacks
A mob in Sri Lanka's Puttalam district killed a Muslim man on Monday amid
anti-Muslim rioting.
A 45-year-old Muslim man was slaughtered in his carpentry shop by a crowd
carrying swords, a police official told local media Monday. He died soon after
being admitted to a hospital, the official added.
On Monday, members of the country's largely Buddhist majority ethnic Sinhalese
attacked Muslim-owned shops and homes in several towns, said Rauff Hakeem, a
Cabinet minister and leader of the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress.
The mob attacked mosques and burned Qurans in violence targeting Muslims for
the Easter bombings.
A group of about a dozen people had arrived in taxis and attacked Muslim-owned
stores with stones just after midday on Monday, they said, with the mob soon
swelling to 200, and then 1,000. Besides the main mosque, the mob attacked 17
Muslim-owned businesses and 50 homes, witnesses said. Abdul Bari, 48, told
Reuters his small brick shop had been burned down with a gas bomb.
"The attackers were on motorbikes, armed with rods and swords," he added.
Others blamed the police for failing to disperse the crowd.
Sri Lankan soldiers in armored vehicles yesterday patrolled towns hit by
sectarian violence this week as residents recalled how Muslims had hidden in
paddy fields to escape mobs attacking their homes and shops. Authorities said
the situation in the worst-affected northwestern parts of the Indian Ocean
island nation was under control after anti-Muslim mobs appeared to have moved
from town to town starting on Sunday.
The government imposed a nationwide curfew Monday and temporarily blocked
social media and messaging apps.
Tensions have been running high in the Buddhist-majority Indian Ocean island
nation since the April 21 attacks by seven suicide bombers who struck two
Catholic and one Protestant church and three luxury hotels. Daesh terror group
claimed responsibility for the attacks, carried out by a local terrorist
group.
Sri Lanka has a dark history of communal tensions. For more than a quarter
century it was embroiled in civil war as Tamil Tiger rebels fought to create
an independent state for or ethnic minority Tamils. When the conflict ended 10
years ago the U.N.'s conservative estimates said about 100,000 people had been
killed.
Sri Lanka's Muslims make up about 9% of its population of 21 million people
and mostly live in the east and center of the island. Mosques and Muslim-owned
properties in the country have been widely attacked, especially by Sinhalese
Buddhists. Some Buddhist nationalists have 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.
Two United Nations advisers warned that the latest attacks against Muslims if
could escalate further if not stopped immediately.
"The country is trying to move forward from a traumatic period of inter-ethnic
armed conflict, but these attacks are pushing Sri Lanka backward. If not
adequately dealt with, the recent violence has the potential to escalate even
further," the advisers said in a statement.
The joint statement was released by Adama Dieng, the U.N. special adviser on
the prevention of genocide, and Karen Smith, the U.N. special adviser on the
responsibility to protect.
Muslim communities across the world have suffered numerous hate attacks over
the past years with many blaming the surge on anti-Muslim discourse in the
media and supported by the politicians. The Christchurch, New Zealand mosque
terror attacks became the latest example of growing far-right terrorism, a
well-known global threat. Extremist politics, including extreme nationalist
and white supremacist politics that appear to be at the core of the latest
terror attack on Muslims in New Zealand, have been part of daily politics for
a long time. The rise of global extremism, with the flourishing of the right
in Europe and U.S. President Donald Trump and the alt-right in America, has
emboldened potential terrorists.
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