XPost: alt.politics.religion, alt.religion, alt.christnet.religion   
   From: hayesstw@telkomsa.net   
      
   Buddhist mobs sweep through Sri Lanka’s Muslim neighborhoods   
      
   KANDY, Sri Lanka (AP) — Buddhist mobs swept through Muslim   
   neighborhoods in Sri Lanka’s central hills, destroying stores and   
   restaurants and setting homes on fire despite a curfew, a state of   
   emergency and a heavy deployment of security forces, residents said   
   Thursday.   
      
   In the small town of Pallekele, mobs ignored the curfew that was   
   supposed to keep them off the streets and used gasoline bombs to burn   
   four homes, said Mohamed Nazar.   
      
   An angry crowd gathered around Nazar’s house around 8 p.m. Wednesday,   
   throwing rocks and shouting, so the family turned off the lights so no   
   one could see inside. “Then a large flame came and the house caught   
   fire,” Nazar said.   
      
   His father hid under a sofa as the flames took hold, but Nazar grabbed   
   him and they ran out. Authorities eventually put out the fire, but   
   much of his family’s belongings were destroyed, he said.   
      
   Many residents of the area around Kandy, the main hill town, described   
   a series of similar attacks since the violence began early this week.   
   The streets of most towns were all but empty except for police and   
   soldiers.   
      
   As evening began to fall Thursday, many Muslims worried that darkness   
   could bring more attacks, and that police would do little to stop   
   them.   
      
   “We can’t trust the army and police. My shop has been attacked in   
   their presence and I don’t know what could happen tonight,” said   
   Mohamed Faraz, whose butcher shop was ransacked.   
      
   The government ordered a state of emergency Tuesday and later shut   
   down popular social media networks, saying they were being used to   
   spread false rumors that led to the attacks.   
      
   “Technology created to bring people together is being used to pull   
   people apart,” technology minister Harin Fernando was quoted as saying   
   by the Sri Lanka Mirror newspaper. “Social media websites such as   
   Facebook, Whatsapp and Viber ... have been used to destroy families,   
   lives and private property.”   
      
   Some see the violence rooted in the spread of hard-line Buddhism.   
      
   Sri Lanka has long faced a bitter ethnic divide between the majority   
   Sinhalese and the minority Tamils, fueling a decades-long civil war as   
   Tamil militants tried to carve out their own homeland.   
      
   But in the years since the war ended in 2009, a religious divide has   
   grown, with the rise of Buddhist nationalist groups that stoke anger   
   against the minority Muslims, saying they are stealing from Buddhist   
   temples or desecrating them, or forcing people to convert to Islam.   
   Muslims also own many of Sri Lanka’s small shops, and many Muslims   
   suspect small-town jealousy has led to some attacks.   
      
   Sinhalese are overwhelmingly Buddhists, while Tamils are mostly Hindu,   
   Muslim and Christian.   
      
   “It is vital that all political leaders, religious and other community   
   leaders condemn violence,” the European Union ambassadors to Sri Lanka   
   said in a statement Thursday, calling for “urgent action against hate   
   crimes.”   
      
   The violence and heavy security presence are largely limited to the   
   island’s central hills. In the capital, Colombo, and other cities and   
   towns, there are few if any signs of trouble.   
      
   Source:   
   https://apnews.com/646133eeefc74fa6a97b155e583b40d5   
      
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