ISLAMIC extremists carried out Sunday’s coordinated attacks in Sri Lanka in retaliation for a March attack on two mosques in New Zealand, said Ruwan Wijewardana, the country’s defense minister.

Addressing parliament yesterday, Wijewardana said that initial investigations showed “the chain of bombings” was carried out by “a radical Islam group” which he named as the National Tawheed Jamath (NTJ).

He said the death toll now stood at 321 and 500 others were injured. Victims from the United Kingdom, India, Australia, China, Japan, Spain and Portugal were confirmed.

A total of nine bombings took place Sunday in the deadliest instance of violence in Sri Lanka since the civil war ended.

Officials found 87 bomb detonators in Colombo, the country’s capital. Twelve detonators were at the main bus depot and 75 in a garbage dump.

No group has yet claimed responsibility.

Last month’s mosque attack in Christchurch, New Zealand, saw at least 50 people murdered in a shooting rampage by a white supremacist. The rampage began at lunchtime on a Friday, when mosques were full of worshippers.

Sri Lanka’s Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe yesterday informed the Parliament that local extremist group NTJ was linked to a global terror network.

Wickremesinghe said that following Sunday’s deadly attacks search operations were ongoing to nab more suspects who were linked to this group and assured that all steps would be taken to prevent terrorism from raising its head in the island country again.

“This was an attack which had been planned for a long time. There were handlers who were guiding the suicide bombers. Police are working to arrest them. We have to consider these extremists to be a part of a global terror network,” the prime minister said.

“We will never allow another war to begin in this country,” he added.

The bombers were all Sri Lankan, authorities said, but international influence is suspected. Police said 40 suspects had been arrested as of early yesterday, including the driver of a van allegedly used by suicide bombers.

A state of emergency, which gave police and the military special powers to counter militant strikes, came into force at midnight – a measure not used since the civil war period. Suspects can be detained without a court order.

Sri Lanka began its day of national mourning yesterday with three minutes of silence to honor those killed. Flags were lowered to half mast on government buildings.

(SD-Agencies)