Sri Lanka’s former president arrested

Sri Lanka’s former president Ranil Wickremesinghe has been arrested in connection with the alleged misuse of funds, police have said.

He faces three charges related to trips he took abroad while serving as president.

Wickremesinghe arrived at magistrates’ court in the capital Colombo on Friday, having already given a statement to the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) earlier in the day. He has been remanded in custody, despite his application for bail on health grounds.

He served as president from 2022 to 2024, stepping into the role after the country’s worst ever economic crisis triggered a popular uprising which caused his predecessor Gotabaya Rajapaksa to flee.

He was widely credited with helping put the island nation back on the road to economic recovery.

Wickremesinghe also served six separate terms as prime minister from the 1990s onwards.

According to BBC Sinhala, the 76-year-old made 23 foreign trips during his time as president, at a cost of more than Rs 600 million ($2m; £1.4m).

Friday’s arrest relates to a stop over made in the UK in 2023, on Wickremesinghe’s way back from a G77 summit in Cuba, news agency AFP reports.

On that occasion, he and his wife had attended a University of Wolverhampton ceremony.

Sri Lanka’s CID allege this was a private visit for which state funds were used – something Wickremesinghe has denied.

Their investigation was initially referred to a court in June.

Wickremesinghe, who is the first former president to be arrested in Sri Lanka, has been a feature of the island nation’s politics since he was first elected as MP in 1977.

A lawyer by profession, he comes from an affluent family of politicians and businessmen.

He was credited with cleaning up the image of the United National Party (UNP) after taking over its leadership in 1994 by bringing in a disciplinary commission to get rid of corrupt party members.

Over the years, he went on to make several bids to become president – only getting the role he had long-wanted in 2022 after Rajapaksa fled.

At the time his party was almost wiped out in the 2020 elections, and he was left as its sole representative in parliament.

He lost the 2024 election to the left-leaning Anura Kumara Dissanayake.