Office of Sri Lankan opposition news website attacked
By DPA, IANSMonday, January 31, 2011
COLOMBO - Attackers broke into the offices of an independent news website in Sri Lanka early Monday, setting fire to equipment and the premises, police said.
Lanka E News, which frequently publishes articles critical of the government, said: “At about 2:00 a.m. today, a group of unknown personnel had broken into the premises and set it on fire.”
“By now everything that was inside the building has been destroyed,” said the statement, posted on the website lankaenews.com, which carries news in English and Sinhala.
“The fax machines, computers and other furniture was brought in the middle of the room and set on fire,” journalist Shantha Wijesuriya said.
President Mahinda Rajapaksa ordered the Inspector General of Police Mahinda Balasuriya to carry out an “urgent inquiry” into the incident, a spokesman for the president’s office said.
The website, which operates out of Malabe, 12 km south of Colombo, said its staff had previously received threats. One of its journalists, Pradeep Ekeneligoda, has been missing for more than one year.
