New Sri Lanka church attacks planned, Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith reveals after receiving ‘foreign information’
- Archbishop of Colombo says in letter he is closing churches and Catholic schools and cancelling public congregations for Mass ‘until further notice’
- Death toll from the April 21 bombings at churches and luxury hotels rose to 257 people from 253 last week
Sri Lanka’s Catholic cardinal received “foreign information” that attempts would be made this week to attack a church and another church institution, according to a letter he sent on Thursday to church officials that later appeared on social media.
Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, the archbishop of Colombo and an outspoken critic of the Sri Lankan government’s apparent failure to act on Indian government intelligence ahead of the Easter attacks, said in the letter that he was closing churches and Catholic schools throughout Sri Lanka and cancelling public congregations for Mass “until further notice”.
“For your own good, we have decided to close down those institutions,” he wrote.
Church spokesman Reverend Edmund Thilakaratne in an interview confirmed the authenticity of the letter but declined to disclose further details, including the source of the foreign information.
An Islamic State-linked group of Sri Lankan nationals carried out coordinated suicide bombings on Easter Sunday at three churches and three luxury hotels on the island that killed 257 people.