The Sri Lankan military has launched an investigation into social media posts alleging that its troops violated lockdown rules by forcing minority Muslims to kneel on the streets.
According to the French news agency AFP, the armed forces ordered the Muslim citizens to raise their hands and kneel on the road in the town of Irvar, 300 km east of the capital Colombo.
In this regard, local residents say they consider the order shameful and humiliating, while officials admit that the soldiers do not have the authority to impose such punishments.
The victims were going to restaurants to buy food.
The military said in a statement that "military police have already launched a preliminary investigation after some images of alleged harassment in the Irrawaddy area went viral."
According to the statement, the officer in charge was removed and the soldiers involved in the incident were ordered to leave the city.
The Sri Lankan military is accused of killing 40,000 civilians in the fight against Tamil separatists. ()
A statement from the Sri Lankan military said, "The military will take strict disciplinary action against any wrongdoing."
It is believed that Sri Lanka has been in a month-long lockdown to deal with the third wave of corona virus.
The death toll from the virus has more than quadrupled to 2,531 since the outbreak began in mid-April.
The Sri Lankan military is facing war crimes charges in its decades-long war against Tamil separatists, which ended in 2009. The army has been deployed to help police and health officials enforce anti-virus restrictions.
Sri Lanka's previous governments have denied that troops killed nearly 40,000 civilians in the final stages of the separatist war, which killed a total of more than 100,000 people between 1972 and 2009. Were killed.
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