What’s happening: The death toll from a wave of bombings across Sri Lanka on Easter Sunday increased to 290 on Monday as authorities arrested 24 people in connection with the attacks.
A government minister described the coordinated bombings as a “brand new type of terrorism,” after a decade of relative calm in Sri Lanka.
CNN reported that Late Sunday, authorities disposed of a six-foot pipe bomb near Bandarayanake International Airport in Colombo. Separately, the US State Department is warning that “terrorist groups continue plotting possible attacks in Sri Lanka.”
The New York Times reports that the Sri Lankan police have arrested 24 people in connection with a series of devastating suicide bombings at hotels and churches on Easter Sunday that left nearly 300 people dead and more than 500 injured.
• The government on Monday blamed National Thowheeth Jama’ath, a little-known radical Islamist organization, for the bombings. An official said the group, which had not carried out any serious attacks before, had help from “an international network.”
