Facebook icon
Twitter icon
e-mail icon

Every single Tamil will be cut into pieces! Sinhala Buddhist monk threatens a massacre

Extremist Sinhala Buddhist monk, Ampitiye Sumanarathana, threatened to kill all of the Tamils in the South this week, in yet another racist outburst that was caught on camera.

"Every single Tamil person will be cut into pieces!" exclaims the monk. "They will all be killed! All the Tamils in the south will be cut into pieces and butchered! The Sinhalese will massacre them."

The clip was reportedly taken on Wednesday in Batticaloa, as the monk clashed with police and locals.

"He’s inciting racial hatred & violence," said parliamentarian Mano Ganesan. "This is unacceptable & disgusting."

Sumanarathana has a long history of racist hate speech and assault.

The monk has threatened to kill a Tamil government official in 2016, subjecting him to verbal slander when he described him as a “Tamil dog” and a “bloody tiger”, while a Sri Lankan police officer watched. He has similarly spewed anti-Muslim hate speech. The same year he was arrested after leading a group of Bodhu Sala Sena (BBS) monks from the south into Batticaloa. Sumanarathana climbed on top of police barriers and recited hate speech against Tamils and Muslims.

In 2019, he physically assaulted a Christian man in Batticaloa whilst Sri Lankan police officers watched on.

In 2020, he threatened to choke a government official over a purported archaeological site. Colombo Gazette reported that the monk said, “tell your superior to come or I will take this pole and kill you”.

In 2021, he threatened officials in Batticaloa, as he staged an impromptu protest at the Divisional Secretariat office demanding land be allocated for the construction of a Buddhist shrine.

We need your support

Sri Lanka is one of the most dangerous places in the world to be a journalist. Tamil journalists are particularly at threat, with at least 41 media workers known to have been killed by the Sri Lankan state or its paramilitaries during and after the armed conflict.

Despite the risks, our team on the ground remain committed to providing detailed and accurate reporting of developments in the Tamil homeland, across the island and around the world, as well as providing expert analysis and insight from the Tamil point of view

We need your support in keeping our journalism going. Support our work today.

For more ways to donate visit https://donate.tamilguardian.com.