Sri Lanka dissolves parliament, sets stage for new elections after detaining opposition leader

Sri Lankan parliament dissolved ahead of new vote

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — Sri Lanka’s president dissolved parliament Tuesday to make way for spring elections a day after authorities arrested a key opposition leader, crippling the only serious threat to the ruling party’s stifling grip on power.

President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s decision follows his sweeping victory at the polls last month over his former army chief Gen. Sarath Fonseka, who had defected to the opposition after helping to end the country’s quarter-century civil war. Fonseka was arrested by the military on Monday on sedition charges.

If last month’s presidential poll is anything to go by, the upcoming parliamentary contest will be another bitter race between the government and the opposition, which says it is being harassed and hounded. Human rights groups have echoed those accusations.

Fonseka’s arrest will likely serve as a warning to others who might seek to challenge the ruling party’s effort to cement its grip on power in the parliamentary poll. Rajapaksa’s ruling coalition is hoping to secure a two-thirds majority in the legislature, giving them virtually unfettered control of this island nation, off the southern tip of India. Already, media rights groups rank Sri Lanka among the most dangerous places in the world for dissenting journalists.

“They did not want (Fonseka) to be in the campaign as some sort of a magnet for the opposition,” said Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu, executive director of the Center for Policy Alternatives, a local public policy group.

An aide to the president said the poll will be held the first week in April. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to disclose the information.

One-time allies, Fonseka and Rajapaksa were both considered heroes by Sri Lanka’s Sinhalese majority for crushing the Tamil Tiger rebels, who were fighting for a homeland for minority Tamils. However, their relationship deteriorated after hostilities ended.

The former army chief was considered the opposition’s best hope to unseat Rajapaksa, but the president secured the re-election in a landslide, according to official results.

His arrest sparked a wave of condemnations.

“This is unprecedented in the history of Sri Lanka,” said Ranil Wickremasinghe, the leader of the largest opposition party, that supported Fonseka’s failed attempt to unseat Rajapaksa. “This is a big blow for democracy in Sri Lanka,” he said.

His arrest leaves a mix of opposition parties — from ultranationalist Sinhalese Marxists to former Tamil separatists — in a difficult spot.

In what could be an attempt to rally its base of supporters, the opposition called Tuesday for countrywide protests while accusing the government of taking the country toward dictatorship.

“We will take this matter to courts, we will take it before the people and we will take it before the international community,” said Rauf Hakeem, another opposition lawmaker.

Fonseka’s wife, Anoma, told reporters Tuesday that she has not been allowed to meet her husband or told where he is being held.

“He was dragged like an animal” from his office Monday, Anoma said. “Is this what he gets for ending a 30-year war?”

“He never wanted to topple the government, while he was in uniform. While he wore the uniform, he never talked about politics,” she said.

Not so, says government minister Keheliya Rambukwella.

“He’s been plotting against the president while in the military … with the idea of overthrowing the government,” Rambukwella said.

Military spokesman Maj. Gen. Prasad Samarasinghe denied that Fonseka has been cut off from family or friends and said that the former commander is not even in a cell. He did not say where Fonseka was being held.

The government heaped more accusations on Fonseka Tuesday. A statement said the former army chief’s reported call for anyone who committed war crimes during the conflict to be prosecuted showed he was “hell-bent on betraying the gallant armed forces of Sri Lanka.”

The issue of whether the government troops, or their superiors, will be prosecuted for war crimes is a sensitive subject in this country.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon expressed “concern” at developments in Sri Lanka. Spokesman Martin Nesirky said the secretary-general plans to speak to president Rajapaksa later Tuesday.

Human rights groups have accused the military, which was led by Fonseka at the time, of shelling hospitals and heavily populated civilian areas during the fighting, and the rebels of holding the local population as human shields. More than 7,000 civilians were killed in the final months of the fighting. Over 100,000 remain displaced in government-run camps.

Associated Press writers Bharatha Mallawarachi and Krishan Francis in Colombo and Nirmala George in New Delhi contributed to this report.