The raise of Buddhist Terrorism බෝධි ත්රස්තවාදය - Article

Sri Lanka is suffering a wave of violence between religious groups that is taking a big proportion. The country has the majority of Hindu and Budhists and suffered last months attacks against christians and some places attacked by a minority os extremist Islamists. The revenge was of the extremist Budhists attacking the Muslim communities at their core, not only the extremists, but the Islamic population, their houses, stores, temples being vandalized and the Government is acting preventing future attacks. The fear of these attacks is that the country suffered for more than 3 decades attacks of the Tamil population, by the group Tamil Tigers, claiming the country, with ethnic cleansing against other ethnicities and criminal activity of terrorism.

At this level of violence some groups that were never considered terrorists or warriors claimed the attacks, the Budhists are claiming the attacks and requesting their identity, with hate speaches agaisnt other ethnicities and supporting new attacks, inclusing armed ones, against the minorities.

The level of extremism is influenced by the Buddhist leader that raised a wave of terror and persecution in Myanmar, the Monk leader Ashin Wirathu.

The 969 Movement, ultra nationalist Buddhist group of Burma,that opposed against Islamo-christian expansion, specially the Islamist, in Burba. The 969 exposes the Symbol of the virtues of Buddha (9 stands of the Lord Buddha, 6 attributes of his Dharma and the 9 attributes of the Buddhist Sangha - Monastic Community.

Wirathu, the a Burmese Buddhist monk and the leader of the anti-Muslim movement was accused by international media of conspiring to persecute Muslims in Myanmar, promoting hate speeches, claiming to be a peaceful preacher, considering the attacks against the Muslims a symbol of peaceful nationnalism. 

Both, the movement and the religious leader are described being Islamophobic, supporting the ultra nationalist propaganda. They deny it.

The group that support this politics in Sri Lanka is the Bodu Bala Sena - Buddhist Power Force - A Sinhalese Buddhinst ultra nationalist organization based in Colombo, Sri Lanka, leadered by Venerable Galagda Aththe Gnanasara and Dilanthe Withanage. This group is born from the break of the right-wing nationalist Jathika Hela Urumaya Organization.

The group was founded by monks Kirama Wimalajothi and Galagoda Aththe Gnanasaara and teh first national convention was at the Bandaranaike Memorial International Conference Hall on 28 July 2012. The convention passed five resolutions which, amongst other things, called for a ban on vasectomy and tubal ligation in government health facilities, replacement of the various legal systems used in the country with a single legal system, preferential treatment in university admission for students who attended Buddhism classes, use of monks in government schools to teach history and other classes, and the avoidance of any race- or religion-based solution for the country's ethnic problems.

The group protested at Bangladeshi high Comission in Colombo against the anti-Buddhist riots and some of the protesters started to throw stones against the commission and the security.

The group also protested against the Islamic Terrorism and the Islamist gangs that vandalized Buddhist temples and sites. 

General secretary Galagoda Athethe Ganasara has accuses the majority of the English speaker language media in the country on working for foreign agendas and being Kalu Suddho (traitors) to the Sinhala Buddhist cause. They accused on the support of multiculturalism, migration to the country and support for diverse religions and ethnic universalization. The group was filmed protesting surrounded by mob of the young men threatening media and other religious groups attacking them as workign for foreign cause, having foreign parents and working for foreign conspirators and being against Sri Lanka. The group was acting violent and promoting support for attacks against the non-Buddhists.

Group received diverse criticism from politicians, human rights groups, and other Buddhist clergy, those who are pro universal pacifism and Muslims from Sri Lanka and abroad.

The International Crisis Group has stated that the extremists attacks on the Muslim community will lead to an increase in Islamic fundamentalism in the country. The Islamic fundamentalists are arming themselves with the return of some members from Iraq and Syria with the clash of Daesh, and they are intented to promote Islamist faith in country. The corruption and the gang violence is big and the police has difficult to fight these groups. In 2012 human rights report have denounced that the country has religious intollerance.

Bodu Bala Sena was accused and criticised by the international obsevers and other political leaders for aggravating the violence between Muslims and Buddhists in the country and since 2017 started a riot against the Muslim communities, with many attacks. In 2019 the groups is being accused of attacking Islamist communities after the Easter Terrorist attack, and the government is having problem on suffocate the violence.