Protestors had earlier battled with supporters of Mahinda Rajapaksa, whose ruling family protesters blame for the country’s economic turmoil.

COLOMBO- An official reported that Sri Lankan Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa resigned Monday after weeks of rallies demanding that he and his brother, President Mahinda Rajapaksa, stand down over the country’s worst economic crisis in decades.

Rajapaksa handed a letter of resignation to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, according to an assistant to the prime minister, Wijayananda Herath. The president’s office did not immediately respond with an official statement.
Following an attack earlier in the day by government supporters on demonstrators camped outside the president and prime minister’s offices, authorities deployed armed forces in the capital, Colombo, on Monday.