President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has fled Sri Lanka on a military aircraft for the Maldives, according to the country’s air force, leaving behind a deepening economic and political crisis in the island nation on a day he was expected to resign in the face of mass protests.
The 73-year-old leader was forced to offer his resignation on Saturday by a street revolt in which tens of thousands of protesters angered by rising prices and shortages of fuel and food converged on Colombo, the commercial capital, and over-ran his palace.
“On government request and under terms of powers available to the president under the constitution, with full approval from the ministry of defence, the president, his wife and two security officials were provided a Sri Lanka air force plane to depart from Katunayake International airport for the Maldives in the early hours of 13 July,” the air force said on Wednesday morning.