Sri Lanka Muslims in mosque demo
27 April, 2012
Charles Haviland 
BBC Colombo Correspondent

Demonstrations have been taking place in Sri Lanka by Muslims angry about hardline Buddhists’ threats against a mosque.

They are also indignant at a government order that the mosque, in the town of Dambulla, should be demolished and rebuilt elsewhere.

Protest

After an unusually packed Friday prayers at this Colombo city congregation, hundreds of mainly young men thronged the street protesting against the monks’ threat to knock down the mosque at Dambulla because it’s allegedly built on land declared sacred by Buddhists.

Mohamed Fazal who was among the protestors said that Buddha never meant anything like that where other religions cannot be practised.

"It is over 50 years old, that mosque, it’s almost 60 years, renovations has to take place for a 50-year-old mosque – doesn’t mean that it’s expansion,he said.

He accused the government of pandering to Buddhist chauvinism and said it was time that Sri Lanka separated the state from its majority religion.

The demonstrators waved the national flag to show their allegiance and said some people were preaching racism and sectarianism.

The government is dominated by Sinhalese Buddhists but denies favouring one group over others.

A spokesman on security matters, Lakshman Hulugalle, issued a statement not mentioning the Dambulla incident but saying the country was a multicultural one where people live in harmony.

Friday prayers

In Dambulla itself Friday prayers went ahead under tight security with no street protests.

But there were Muslim demonstrations in a number of cities and most of the businesses in the Muslim-dominated bazaar district of Colombo were shut.

The government says that not just the mosque but 72 structures in what’s called the sacred area of Dambulla will be moved within six months. That is a highly controversial decision.