The politics of a plot to kill Sri Lanka’s president

A plot to kill the president, links to foreign intelligence, a rogue police officer and a missing sniper: the snippets of news emerging from Sri Lanka in recent weeks seem plucked from the pages of paperback fiction.

But the allegations have had real enough consequences for the island nation, contributing to upending its politics, undermining its currency and credit rating, and affecting relations with giant neighbor India.

President Maithripala Sirisena sacked Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe in October, just weeks after a little-known social activist alleged he had heard of a plot to assassinate the president from a police officer.

Reuters has learned that investigators have not found any substantial evidence to back up the claim, although Sirisena said in a newspaper interview this month that the refusal of Wickremesinghe to take the plot seriously was the final straw leading to his dismissal.

A spokesman for Sirisena did not respond to Reuters’ requests for comment.

Sirisena said in the interview with Ceylon Today: “I was completely disappointed by the way things were moving.”

Referring to the assassination plot, he added: “They (the authorities) displayed utter lethargy.”

Wickremesinghe has said he never interfered with the investigations and kept Sirisena informed of their progress.

Sri Lanka has a long history of political assassinations in decades of civil war, making Sirisena’s allegations all the more explosive.

“It is hard to know what the truth is and many people are skeptical (of the plot),” said a senior Western diplomat in Sri Lanka’s capital Colombo. “It’s part of the politics,” he added.

What is clear is the drama has paralyzed the island nation and left it without a functioning government for months.

The alleged plot first came to light on September 12, when self-styled anti-corruption activist and police informant Namal Kumara gathered a few local journalists and made a series of accusations against a senior police officer.