protests

The mass demonstrations are a response to a leaked draft opinion showing the Supreme Court's conservative majority is poised to overturn a landmark 1973 ruling guaranteeing abortion access nationwide.

The new premier, Ranil Wickremesinghe, has already served in the office five times – but it remains to be seen whether he will be able to get any legislation through parliament.

Reprisals carried on late into the night and through the next day, with mobs setting alight dozens of homes belonging to ruling-party politicians around the country.

Police and soldiers patrolled the streets of Weerakettiya, the town that is home to the Rajapaksas, where shops and businesses were shut by a curfew set to run until Thursday morning.

Protesters angered by shortages of fuel, cooking gas and electricity defied the curfew to attack government figures, setting ablaze homes, shops and businesses belonging to ruling party lawmakers and provincial politicians.

The government of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, the younger brother of the prime minister, outlined broad powers for the military and police to detain and question people without arrest warrants.

Sri Lanka has suffered months of blackouts and dire shortages of food, fuel and medicines in its worst economic crisis since independence.

Macron defeated far-right leader Marine Le Pen in a runoff vote by winning a second five-year term and preventing what would otherwise have been a major political upset.

Pressure on the powerful Rajapaksa family has intensified in recent days, with the country's vital business community also withdrawing support for them over the weekend.

At least 41 lawmakers have walked out of the ruling coalition to become independents, though the government says it still has a majority in parliament.

Rajapaksa, governing the country since 2019 with other family members in top positions, revoked a state of emergency as dozens of lawmakers walked out of the ruling coalition, leaving his government in a minority.

Severe shortages of food, fuel and other essentials have inflicted widespread misery in the country's most painful downturn since independence from Britain in 1948.