US says external groups likely behind Sri Lanka attacks
Foreign partners from the UK and Australia, as well as the FBI and US military, are helping the country’s investigations
Colombo — The scale and sophistication of the Easter Sunday attacks on churches and hotels in Sri Lanka suggests the involvement of an external group such as Islamic State (IS), the US ambassador said on Wednesday as the death toll jumped to 359. The IS militant group has claimed responsibility for the co-ordinated bomb attacks on churches and hotels, but gave no evidence to support the claim. Sri Lankan officials have blamed two domestic Islamist groups with suspected ties to IS. Details have begun to emerge of a band of nine, well-educated suicide bombers, including a woman, from well-to-do families. “If you look at the scale of the attacks, the level of co-ordination, the sophistication of them, it’s not implausible to think there are foreign links,” the US ambassador to Sri Lanka, Alaina Teplitz, told reporters in Colombo. “Exploring potential linkage is going to be part of [investigations].” Teplitz said the US FBI and the US military are supporting the investigation. “Our hop...
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