Sri Lanka's new prime minister will address the crisis-hit nation later on Monday, as the country's power minister told citizens not to join the lengthy fuel queues that have galvanized weeks of anti-government protests.
Ranil Wickremesinghe, appointed prime minister on Thursday, said he would give a "full explanation" of the financial crisis that has devastated the strategic Indian Ocean island nation, where China and India are battling for influence.
But the protesters have said they will keep up their campaign as long as Gotabaya Rajapaksa remains president. They have also labelled Wickremesinghe a stooge and criticised his appointment of four cabinet minister, all members of the political party run by the Rajapaksa brothers. Hit hard by the pandemic, rising oil prices and populist tax cuts by the Rajapaksas, Sri Lanka is in the midst of a crisis unparalleled since its independence in 1948.