Sri Lanka Speaker takes U-turn, says President Gotabaya Rajapaksa still in country

Sri Lanka Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena said that President Gotabaya Rajapaksa is still in the country. The speaker made a U-turn as he had earlier said that Rajapaksa had fled the country and would return by Wednesday.

Sri Lanka Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena on Monday took a U-turn on President Gotabaya Rajapaksa's whereabouts and said that the president is still in the country.

Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena said that he made a mistake in an interview with the BBC. Earlier, the speaker had told BBC that Gotabaya Rajapaksa left the island and he is in a nearby country. In an interview with BBC, he had said that the President would be back in Sri Lanka by Wednesday.

However, on Monday, the speaker issued a clarification and told news agency ANI that the President is still in the country.

"President of Sri Lanka Gotabaya Rajapaksa is still in the country, I made a mistake in the (BBC) interview," speaker of Sri Lanka’s Parliament Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena told ANI.

Thousands of protesters stormed into the official residence of Sri Lanka President Gotabaya Rajapaksa in rage over the government's mishandling of the country's worst economic crisis.

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Protesters swarmed into the residence of Gotabaya and visuals of them working out at the gym, swimming in the president's pool, dining in the kitchen and relaxing in the bedrooms went viral. Protesters claimed that they had found millions of rupees in the president's house, which they returned over to the security units.