9 suicide bombers, including woman took part in Easter Sunday bombings in Lanka: police
Colombo: Nine suicide bombers, including a woman, were involved in the massive Easter Sunday bombings and 60 people have been arrested so far for their suspected links to Sri Lanka's worst terror attack that killed at least 359 people, a top police officer said Wednesday.
Suicide bombers, believed to be members of local extremist group, carried out a series of devastating blasts that tore through churches and luxury hotels in Sri Lanka on Sunday.
The state minister of defence Ruwan Wijewardena said the multiple bomb attacks were carried out not by the National Tawheed Jamath (NTJ) but by its splinter group.
Sri Lanka's government had earlier blamed the blasts on the NTJ.
Wijewardena told reporters that the members of the group had differences and the final attack was carried out by a group that left the main NTJ.
The Islamic State terror group has claimed the attack, although it did not provide direct evidence of its involvement. Wijewardena said there was no evidence at present whether the splinter group had any foreign connections.
Out of the nine suicide bombers, eight have been identified by the Criminal Investigation Department (CID), Police Spokesman Ruwan Gunasekara said.
The ninth bomber was confirmed as the wife of one of the suicide bombers, he said.
He said the death toll has jumped to 359 on Wednesday, up from a previous count of 321 people. Nearly 500 people have been injured in the attack.
Ten Indian nationals have been confirmed dead.
Sixty people have been arrested for possible links to the multiple attacks carried out on Easter Sunday. Of them, 32 are in custody with the CID. All of those arrested are of Sri Lankan nationality, Gunasekara said.
State defense minister Wijewardene said the majority of Sunday's suicide bombers were from well-heeled families. They were also well-educated, including at least university graduate who had studied abroad.
"Most of them are well-educated, and come from maybe middle- or upper-middle-class. So they are financially quite independent and their families are quite stable financially," he said.
Wijewardene said, "We believe that one of the suicide bombers studied in the UK and maybe later on did his post-graduate in Australia, before coming back to settle in Sri Lanka."
The number of foreign nationals who have been identified as killed is 34. Additionally, 14 foreign nationals are unaccounted for at present, and could be among the unidentified victims at the Colombo Judicial Medical Officer's mortuary, officials said.
Sixteen foreign nationals injured in the attacks are receiving treatment at the Colombo National Hospital and private hospitals in Colombo while others have been treated and discharged.
An attack on a fourth hotel on Sunday was foiled, Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe said on Tuesday. He also warned that more militants and explosives could still be "out there" following the attack.
The country remains tense with police still looking for suspects and possible further explosives. But Wickremesinghe said the attacks "could not have been done just locally". "There had been training given and a coordination which we are not seeing earlier," he said.
A state of emergency remains in effect to prevent further attacks. The emergency powers allow the security forces to crackdown in law and order breaches by sudden searches of property, arrests and detention of people indefinitely.
Speaking in parliament the former commander of the Army, Field Martial Sarath Fonseka said removing the police chief Pujith Jayasundera was not answer to the security lapse which had led to the attacks. The government had demanded Jayasundera's resignation.
President Maithripala Sirisena in an address to the nation on Tuesday said that he would effect a shuffle in the security establishment within 24 hours. It was expected that he would call for the resignation of Jayasundera.
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Israel launches first airstrike on Lebanon since ceasefire, accusing Hezbollah of breaching truce
Beirut, Nov 28: The Israeli military on Thursday said its warplanes fired on southern Lebanon after detecting Hezbollah activity at a rocket storage facility, the first Israeli airstrike a day after a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah took hold.
There was no immediate word on casualties from Israel's aerial attack, which came hours after the Israeli military said it fired on people trying to return to certain areas in southern Lebanon. Israel said they were violating the ceasefire agreement, without providing details. Lebanon's state-run National News Agency said two people were wounded.
The back-to-back incidents stirred unease about the agreement, brokered by the United States and France, which includes an initial two-month ceasefire in which Hezbollah members are to withdraw north of the Litani River and Israeli forces are to return to their side of the border. The buffer zone would be patrolled by Lebanese troops and UN peacekeepers.
On Thursday, the second day of a ceasefire after more than a year of bloody conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, Lebanon's state news agency reported that Israeli fire targeted civilians in Markaba, close to the border, without providing further details. Israel said it fired artillery in three other locations near the border. There were no immediate reports of casualties.
An Associated Press reporter in northern Israel near the border heard Israeli drones buzzing overhead and the sound of artillery strikes from the Lebanese side.
The Israeli military said in a statement that “several suspects were identified arriving with vehicles to a number of areas in southern Lebanon, breaching the conditions of the ceasefire.” It said troops “opened fire toward them” and would “actively enforce violations of the ceasefire agreement.”
Israeli officials have said forces will be withdrawn gradually as it ensures that the agreement is being enforced. Israel has warned people not to return to areas where troops are deployed, and says it reserves the right to strike Hezbollah if it violates the terms of the truce.
A Lebanese military official said Lebanese troops would gradually deploy in the south as Israeli troops withdraw. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief media.
The ceasefire agreement announced late Tuesday ended 14 months of conflict between Israel and Hezbollah that began a day after Hamas' Oct. 7, 2023 attack out of Gaza, when the Lebanese Hezbollah group began firing rockets, drones and missiles in solidarity.
Israel retaliated with airstrikes, and the conflict steadily intensified for nearly a year before boiling over into all-out war in mid-September. The war in Gaza is still raging with no end in sight.
More than 3,760 people were killed by Israeli fire in Lebanon during the conflict, many of them civilians, according to Lebanese health officials. The fighting killed more than 70 people in Israel — over half of them civilians — as well as dozens of Israeli soldiers fighting in southern Lebanon.
Some 1.2 million people were displaced in Lebanon, and thousands began streaming back to their homes on Wednesday despite warnings from the Lebanese military and the Israeli army to stay out of certain areas. Some 50,000 people were displaced on the Israeli side, but few have returned and the communities near the northern border are still largely deserted.
In Menara, an Israeli community on the border with views into Lebanon, around three quarters of homes are damaged, some with collapsed roofs and burnt-out interiors. A few residents could be seen gathering their belongings on Thursday before leaving again.
