Sri Lanka parliament sacked

Sirisena signs dismissal of assembly, clears way for snap elections

COLOMBO: President Maithripala Sirisena sacked Sri Lanka’s parliament hours after his party announced he did not have a majority to get his prime minister nominee through the legislature, a minister said.

Sirisena signed an official notification dismissing the 225-member assembly with effect from midnight, clearing the way for a snap election nearly two years ahead of schedule, the minister said asking not to be named.

“The election is likely to be held in early January,” the minister said after the United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA) said they were eight legislators short of a majority in the 225-member assembly that remains suspended.

The European Union had earlier in the day joined a chorus of international voices demanding an end to Sri Lanka’s two-week-old political crisis, saying the island nation’s international reputation and investments are at risk.

Sirisena on Oct 26 sacked Ranil Wickremesinghe as prime minister, replacing him with the divisive Mahinda Rajapaksa.

Wickremesinghe is holed up in his official residence refusing to go, saying his removal would be illegal, while Rajapaksa is running a parallel administration from the prime minister’s office.

Sirisena had initially suspended parliament until next Wednesday as he and Rajapaksa tried to gather enough support among lawmakers to vote Wickremesinghe out.

Amid rumours that Sirisena may seek to delay matters further, the EU, in a joint statement with Norway and Switzerland yesterday, said parliament should vote “immediately when reconvened”.

The United States, the United Nations, Australia and several other countries also urged Colombo to end the power struggle and restore confidence.

On Thursday, Wickremesinghe thanked his supporters and urged them not to give up.

“In extraordinary numbers and with extraordinary courage you came out on to the streets, you spoke out,” Wickremesinghe said in a video message posted on Facebook.

His supporters staged a noisy cavalcade of motorcycles, auto-rickshaws, cars and vans in the capital Colombo on Thursday.

The power struggle on the island of 21 million people paralysed much of the administration, according to legislators.

Sirisena has filled only 22 of 30 Cabinet positions, purposefully keeping some vacant to tempt legislators of Wickremesinghe’s party to defect to Rajapakse’s side. — AFP SEOUL: Seven tenants were killed and 11 others injured early yesterday when a blaze ripped through a three-storey studio complex in Seoul, fire authorities said. The dead and injured were mostly casual labourers or street vendors in their 40s to 60s, living in the dilapidated building, which had no sprinklers, Yonhap news agency said. ”I heard screams and went out. Then I saw the building enveloped by a lot of smoke and flames,” a 61-year-old businessman living across the street told Yonhap. With labyrinthine structures with narrow corridors, goshiwon buildings are notoriously vulnerable to blazes, with more than 250 breaking out over the past five years. — AFP