Sri Lanka court grants bail to Muslim doctor falsely accused of sterilisation

<p>Kurunegala Magistrate’s Court has granted bail to a Muslim doctor, Mohamed Shafi, who was falsely accused of having sterilised over 4,000 Sinhala women.</p> <p>Safi was given bail of 2.5 million rupees after a five-hour court hearing.&nbsp;</p> <p>His defence lawyer, Faris Saly, that when he was initially arrested in May, the judge found “no reason to refuse bail”.</p> <p>Nationalist Buddhist monks and other locals had crowded outside of the court to demand his continued detention. They allege that Muslims are seeking to spread influence by maintaining a higher birth rate and hampering the birthrate of Sinhala Buddhists.</p> <p>Supporters of Safi have maintained that the accusations are spurious and are founded on inter-communal tensions. His arrest followed the tragic Easter Sunday bombing which took over 250 lives and was blames on Islamist militants. Following the bombings a nationalist newspaper, Divaina, ran a front-page story accusing an unidentified doctor of sterilising as many as 4,000 women after performing cesarean deliveries.&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;In late February to early March 2018, similar rumours were circulated on Facebook of a Muslim restaurant hiding sterilisation pills in the food they served to the Sinhala majority. This lead to anti-Muslim pogroms in which Muslim citizens, their property and mosques were attacked and state forces were seen to have been involved.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>Read more <a href="https://www.tamilguardian.com/content/sri-lankan-court-remands-muslim-d…">here</a>,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/21/world/asia/facebook-sri-lanka-riots…">here</a> and <a href="https://www.tamilguardian.com/content/sinhala-mob-damages-muslim-shops-…">here</a>.&nbsp;</p>