Rights defenders and church officials in Sri Lanka have deplored the police raid on a remote parish church allegedly to search for a Catholic priest who has been a key figure in anti-government protests in the crisis-hit nation.
Police raided the church at Ratnapura in Sabaragamuwa Province of south-central Sri Lanka on July 27 and searched for Father Amila Jeewantha Peiris, media reports said.
The raid came two days after a Sri Lanka court slapped a travel ban on the 45-year-old priest and five others for their alleged participation in “unlawful assembly and damage to public property” during a protest rally in June.
Father Peiris has been at the forefront of the months-long anti-government pro-test at Galle Face Green in the capital Colombo that effectively ousted the long-reigning Rajapaksa family dynasty blamed for the nation’s worst economic crisis.
The huge protests forced President Gotabaya Rajapaksa to flee the country and resign. Last week, parliament elected former prime minister Ranil Wickreme-singhe as the new president. However, protests have continued demanding the resignation of Wickremesinghe, who is known as a loyalist of the Rajapaksa dynasty.
Prominent rights activist Ruki Fernando said police actions against Father Peiris are absolutely unacceptable, noting that he is among the few Sinhalese Catholic priests who have spent years serving communities in minority Tamil-dominant North and East that were ravaged by decades of civil war in the ethnically-divided Sri Lanka.
The priest is loved by the Tamil clergy, religious and laity, said Fernando, a consultant to the Justice, Peace and Integrity of Creation Commission of the Conference of Major Religious Superiors.
“He faces reprisals for his unwavering commitment to the struggle of people. I hope church leaders and all others will come forward to support and protect him, as he had done for others,” he told.