The death toll in the Easter Sunday Sri Lanka terror attacks rose to 310 on Sunday, Sri Lankan police said. 26 people have been arrested in connection with the attacks that Sri Lanka government said was carried out by local outfit National Thowheed Jamath. Sri Lankan authorities have ordered a state of emergency to be imposed from midnight on Monday, the Sri Lankan president's office said.
Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena said that intelligence reports indicated that foreign terrorist organisations were behind the "local terrorists" and that he would seek the assistance of foreign countries.
Health Minister Rajitha Senaratne said, was a result of "colossal intelligence failure" as there was prior information about the attack. He demanded the resignation of the Inspector General of Police.
"As a government, we apologize to families and other institutions. The problem is that even when we met the Prime Minister at the Cabinet meeting, the Prime Minister was also in the dark," he said.
A government forensic crime investigator said an examination of the attackers' body parts showed that they were suicide bombers.
On Monday, a police spokesman said that 87 bomb detonators had been found at the main bus station in the capital, Colombo, and a nearby garbage dump. Earlier, police said that they had defused an improvised bomb at the international airport in Colombo.
The Indian Embassy on Monday night confirmed that ten Indians have been confirmed killed in the attacks. Five of the people were part of a seven-member group of JD(S) workers who travelled to Sri Lanka, Karnataka CM HD Kumaraswamy said. The Chief Minister had earlier stated that three other JD(S) workers – H Shivu Kumar, A Maregowda and H Puttaraju – were missing and officials had not been able to establish communication with them.
Regret to confirm the deaths of two more Indian nationals Mr. A Maregowda and Mr. H Puttaraju in the blasts in Sri Lanka on Sunday, taking the total number of Indian deaths in the tragedy to 10 as of now.@SushmaSwaraj
— India in Sri Lanka (@IndiainSL) April 23, 2019
Sri Lankan Foreign Ministry has confirmed the death of one more individual - H Shivakumar - in the blasts yesterday, taking the total number of Indian deaths in the tragedy to 8 till now.@SushmaSwaraj
— India in Sri Lanka (@IndiainSL) April 22, 2019