(Colombo) The situation remains uncertain on Sunday in Sri Lanka where President Gotabaya Rajapaksa agreed to resign next week, after being forced to flee his palace invaded by the crowd of demonstrators protesting against the catastrophic crisis hitting the country.
Posted at 7:32
The United States on Sunday urged the country’s future new leaders to “work quickly” on solutions to deteriorating economic conditions, “including shortages of electricity, food and fuel”, a spokesperson said. from the State Department.
“To ensure a peaceful transition, the president said he would resign on July 13,” Speaker of Parliament Mahinda Abeywardana said on Saturday on television.
Two people close to the president resigned without delay: the head of the press service Sudewa Hettiarachchi and the media minister Bandula Gunawardana, who also left his post at the head of the presidential party.
Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe tried to pave the way for a government of national unity, calling a government crisis meeting with opposition parties and proposing his resignation.
But that was not enough to calm the anger of the demonstrators who in the evening besieged his residence, in his absence, and set fire to it, without causing any injuries.
PHOTOGRAPH BY ARUN SANKAR, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Men play cards in the Prime Minister’s residence.
President Rajapaksa, 73, in the hot seat for months, was able to flee minutes before several hundred protesters entered his palace, normally reserved for receptions but where he had moved into in April after the assault on his private home .
Soldiers guarding the official residence fired in the air to deter protesters from approaching the palace until the president was evacuated and boarded a military ship en route, according to a military source, to the Trincomalee naval base in the northeast of the island.
A seriously injured
After midnight Saturday, the Chief of the Defense Staff, General Shavendra Silva, appealed for calm on television, assuring: “There is a possibility of resolving the crisis peacefully and constitutionally”.
Colombo National Hospital, the capital’s main hospital, reported 105 people admitted after Saturday’s protests and 55 still receiving treatment on Sunday. Among the injured are seven journalists. “One person is in very serious condition after a gunshot wound,” spokeswoman Pushpa Soysa told AFP.
On Sunday, protesters still occupying the presidential palace said they would not leave until the president actually resigns.
PHOTO DINUKA LIYANAWATTE, REUTERS
Protesters spent the night at the presidential palace.
“Our fight is not over,” student leader Lahiru Weerasekara told reporters. “We won’t give up on this fight until it really leaves.”
Student activists said they found 17.8 million rupees (about C$63,000) in Mr Rajapaksa’s room and handed it over to the police.
Saturday, the demonstrations to require the resignation of Mr. Rajapaksa gathered in Colombo hundreds of thousands of people. Clashes opposed demonstrators to the police who tried to disperse them with tear gas.
PHOTO ERANGA JAYAWARDENA, ASSOCIATED PRESS ARCHIVES
President Gotabaya Rajapaksa
Local television channels then showed images of hundreds of people climbing the gates of the presidential palace. Protesters livestreamed videos of the crowds marching inside on social media, with some swarming around the presidential pool or sleeping quarters.
The mine
The protesters also took over the nearby presidential offices on Saturday evening, in front of which demonstrators had been camping for three months.
PHOTO AMAL JAYASINGHE, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
A man sitting at the desk of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa
Once a middle-income country with a standard of living envied by India, Sri Lanka has been devastated by the loss of tourism revenue following a jihadist attack in 2019 and then the COVID-19 pandemic.
The crisis, unprecedented since independence in 1948 of this island of 22 million inhabitants, has been aggravated, according to economists, by a series of bad political decisions of which the presidential clan in power since 2005 is accused by the population.
The country is negotiating a rescue plan with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which said on Sunday that it hoped “a settlement of the current situation so as to allow the resumption of our dialogue”.
On Sunday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Russia’s restrictions on Ukrainian grain exports may have contributed to shortages in Sri Lanka.
And Pope Francis said his solidarity with the people of Sri Lanka. “I implore those in authority not to ignore the cry of the poor and the needs of the people,” he said.