A joint search operation; involving army, special task force (STF) and police officers, was carried out in Kurunagar, Jaffna between 5:30 am and 6:00 am today, as military surveilance in the North continues.
The police ordered an unexpected round-up of the local residents, in which no suspects were arrested and no suspicious items were recovered. Police officials insisted that these operations were carried out for the sake of national security.
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A similar operation involving army and police officers also took place in Tellipalai, Jaffna on Saturday.
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There has been a noticeable rise in surveillance operations across various locations of the country since Gotabaya Rajapaksa took office as the Sri Lankan president.
The latest operations comes as a report by the International Truth and Justice Project – Sri Lanka (ITJP) and Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka (JDS), which documented at least 69 recent incidents of intimidation and threats, said the Sri Lankan government is “unleashing a chilling process of repression targeting critics and human rights defenders”.
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