India-based Reuters photojournalist Danish Siddiqui was granted bail by a Sri Lankan court on Friday, a day after he was arrested for allegedly trespassing into the Maris Stella College in Negombo city, PTI reported.
The Negombo magistrate had remanded him in custody till May 15, Daily Mirror reported. The institute’s principal told the police that the Mumbai-based journalist attempted to forcibly enter its premises.
Siddiqui had purportedly attempted to enter the facility to speak to authorities about a student who was killed in the bombing of St Sebastian’s Church in Katuwapitiya on April 21, Colomba Gazette reported.
Sri Lanka has been tense after a group of suicide bombers carried out a series of blasts at churches and luxury hotels on Eastern Sunday, killing at least 253 people. The Islamic State group has claimed responsibility for the attacks. Two other local Islamist groups – the National Thowheed Jamath and the Jammiyathul Millathu Ibrahim – are suspected to have links to the blasts. They were banned last week.
Siddiqui was one of two Indians in the seven-member Reuters team that won the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for feature photography for their series documenting the violence faced by Myanmar’s minority Rohingya community and their mass exodus to Bangladesh starting from August 2017.
Reuters declined to comment, AFP reported.
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