Sri Lanka’s Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa has resigned after protests over the island nation’s worsening economic crisis turned deadly.
In a statement on Monday, his office said he was quitting in order to help form an interim, unity government, following weeks of sometimes violent protests across the country over shortages of fuel and other vital imports and spiraling prices.
Earlier, a government official said Rajapaksa, who has dominated Sri Lankan politics for nearly 20 years and whose government crushed the Tamil Tigers to bring an end to a long civil war, has sent his letter of resignation to the president.
President Gotabaya Rajapaksa is the prime minister’s younger brother.
Rajapaksa’s spokesman Rohan Weliwita said the 76-year-old leader sent his resignation to clear the way for a “new unity government” suggested by the president to fight the country’s worst economic crisis since independence from the British rule in 1948.
Rajapaksa’s resignation comes hours after his party’s supporters stormed a major protest site in the capital Colombo, attacking anti-government demonstrators and clashing with police who used tear gas and water cannon to drive them back.
At least three people, including an MP, have been killed and more than 150 wounded in the clashes.
“The violence unleashed by Rajapaksa’s supporters really started this day of violence,” Al Jazeera’s Minelle Fernandez.
A curfew has been imposed across the island nation of 22 million people after the violence.Protests against the powerful Rajapaksas have raged for weeks, with thousands demanding the influential family quit for mishandling the economy.
“Sacrificing Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa for the president’s survival is not something that is going to go down easily with the protesters,” she said.
“People actually have reached the top of their tolerance and are not willing to take anymore whether it be in the form of intimidation or the state of emergency imposed a couple of days ago. It does not seem to be any effect on people, who say ‘enough is enough’. They are going to take a stand until Rajapaksas and the government resign,” she said.
