(COLOMBO) – Sri Lanka’s ongoing police operation to rope in criminals such as drug dealers, users and others suffered a major setback on Tuesday after the leader of a political party and four others were shot dead in broad day light.
The incident took place at an intersection that leads to an expressway at Beliatte some 196 kilometres south of the country’s commercial capital of Colombo.
Saman Perera the leader of the ‘Ape Jana Bala Party’ and four of his colleagues were gunned down in cold blood as they stopped at a roadside eatery.
Perera was also an unsuccessful candidate at the last presidential elections held in 2019 and was married to a billionaire doctor.
The group was on its way to attend a court hearing when the incident took place, according to police.
The victims were pumped with some 36 rounds of bullets fired from assault rifles and the police are yet to trace those behind it.
It only the other day that the Minister of Public Security Tiran Alles boasted that they had neutralized a large section of criminal elements in the country with the arrests of more than 40, 000 persons arrested since the operation ‘Yukthiya’ or Justice was launched on Christmas Eve last year.
The operation has also come under heavy criticism from across the legal fraternity and both local and international rights groups who claim those being arrested are being held in appalling conditions and without access to lawyers or a court.
The US Embassy in Colombo has also expressed its concern on the handling of the so-called anti-crime operation and called on the Government to act within the framework of democracy.
