Sri Lanka : President, PM To Resign Amid Massive Protests
The protesters also torched the private residence of Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe even after he offered to resign.
Thousands of anti-government protesters in Sri Lanka on Saturday barged into embattled President Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s official residence.
In central Colombo’s high-security Fort area after breaking the barricades, as they demanded his resignation over the island nation’s worst economic crisis in recent memory.
The protesters also torched the private residence of Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe even after he offered to resign.
Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena told reporters on Saturday night that President Rajapaksa had agreed to step down on July 13. Prime Minister Wickremesinghe said he would resign as soon as an all-party government was ready to take over.
Sri Lanka’s inflation topped 50 per cent in June after two years of money printing and an attempted float botched with a surrender requirement which sent the rupee sliding to 360 to the US dollar from 200.