The Easter Sunday attacks that killed more than 320 people in Sri Lanka were a response to the mass shooting at a mosque in Christchurch in March, Sri Lanka’s minister of state for defense has told the country’s parliament.
Ruwan Wijewardene told a special sitting of the national body on Tuesday afternoon that investigations had shown “this attack was carried out in retaliation for the attack against Muslims in Christchurch”, he said.
An intelligence memo circulated to some in government in the weeks before the attack noted that one member of the terrorist group identified as having perpetrated the bombings had started to update his social media accounts “with extremist content” in the aftermath of the shootings by a rightwing-extremist in New Zealand who killed 50 people.
But terrorism researchers have said the sophisticated nature of the attack and the equipment used would likely have required months of preparation, including conditioning the suicide bombers and testing the explosives.
Wijewardene also told parliament that the death toll had climbed to 321 people including 38 foreigners, and reiterated that the prime minister and other key officials were never told about the possibility of an impending attack.
The eight-year-old grandson of the Bangladeshi prime minister Sheikh Hasina died in one of the hotel blasts, the country’s media has reported.
Zayan Chowdhury was having breakfast with his father at a hotel in Colombo when a suicide bomber detonated his device.
Labor MP Tulip Siddiq, niece of the Bangladeshi prime minister, tweeted that she lost a relative in the attack on Sunday
US President Donald Trump called Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe on Monday to pledge US support in bringing the perpetrators to justice.
The Washington Post quoted an unidentified law enforcement official as saying Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents were being sent to Sri Lanka to assist in the investigation.
