Colombo, December 24, 2023 (KAP/KNA) In Sri Lanka, the police and military have a heavy presence at Christmas. In addition to protecting churches in this predominantly Buddhist island nation, security forces arrested 15,000 people in a nationwide anti-drug operation. Among those detained were 1,000 drug addicts who were sent to a military facility for forced rehabilitation, media reported. During the operation, 440 kilos of various illegal drugs, such as cannabis and heroin, were also confiscated. However, new measures are expected to be lifted on Christmas Day because security forces are needed to protect churches. The attacks would continue after December 26th.
Human rights lawyers criticized the operations as illegal because they were carried out without search warrants. Drug use and trafficking are widespread in Sri Lanka, although criminals involved in drug trafficking face the death penalty in this South Asian country. Contrary to the Catholic Church's official teaching on the death penalty, the Archbishop of Colombo, Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, welcomed the reintroduction of the death penalty for drug traffickers in July 2018.
Meanwhile, the Sri Lanka Police announced enhanced security measures for churches on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. On Easter 2019, 269 people died and 500 were injured in bomb attacks on three churches in the capital Colombo. The perpetrators were Islamic terrorists. However, the intellectual authors of terrorism have not yet been identified. Cardinal Ranjith and many security experts still express the suspicion that the then Sri Lankan government participated in the attacks for reasons of power politics.