Early Easter Sunday after the lives of over 300 families were ripped apart the Sri Lankan Government was faced with the new arrival of Islamic Extremism. In the midst of the dysfunction of high level government officials, said to have been distracted by the feud between the President and Prime Minister, suicide bombers had advantage to recruit and easily bypass security intelligence to carry out the vicious coordinated attacks.
After a week of reports stating that the Sri Lankan Government chose to not take action when warned by Indian and US intelligence that an attack was imminent, officials are charged with repairing a mistake which cost the lives of hundreds and confidence of millions. Sri Lankan officers have name a Zaharan Hashim, recently radicalized by the Islamic terrorist group ISIS, as the “leading figure in the band of suicide bombers.” Zaharan’s infamous for preaching hate and violence for years is said to have blown himself up at the Shanghai-La Hotel in Colombo.
While investigations continue in efforts to prove that Zaharan was the point person in these attacks, Sri Lankan officials must also address the negative impact on the economy and the overall negative moral of the island. The tourism industry is worth almost $4.4 billion each year, accounting for almost 5% of the country’s annual GDP. Since the civil war, tourist arrivals have gone up 4.7% each year leading to an all time high of almost 300,000 visitors last December. With an incoming heighten sense of islamophobia, setback of any future plans will very likely cause some future setbacks resulting in the market suffering some negative pressures.
Many argue that there is a double standard surfacing where a European church burning takes precedence over an East Asian lives being lost in a violent church bombing. With no apparent backing from any major world powers, the Sri Lankan government is left to pick up the pieces with efforts to raise donations, currently a total of $23,624 and a recent loan for 1.5 Billion from the IMF.
