Emergency declared in Sri Lanka ahead of July 20 presidential election

Sri Lanka’s acting president Ranil Wickremesinghe on Monday declared a state of emergency in the country with immediate effect, ahead of the election for the post of the president which fell vacant after Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s resignation following the popular public uprising against him.

Under emergency, security forces are allowed to search, arrest seize, and remove weapons and explosives, enter and search premises, and body-search persons.

The government gazette notofication dated July 17 was issued Monday morning. The 225-member Parliament is expected to elect the new president on July 20.

The president is empowered to impose emergency regulations part 2 of the public security ordinance which says “(a) if the president is of the opinion that the police are inadequate to deal with a situation he may gazette an order calling out the armed forces to maintain public order”.

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