Modi meets Mahinda Rajapaksa

Colombo, March 14
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday met former Sri Lankan president Mahinda Rajapaksa in one of his last engagements here.

Modi, who had gone to Jaffna, Anuradhapura and Talaimanar in the morning, met Rajapaksa in the evening.

The meeting between Modi and the former long-time Sri Lankan president comes as Rajapaksa has alleged that India, the US and European countries were openly working to defeat him, and took the name of India's Research Analysis Wing (RAW), the external intelligence agency.

"It was very open, Americans, the Norwegians, Europeans were openly working against me. And RAW," Rajapaksa told the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post in an interview.

"Both the US and India openly used their embassies to bring me down," Rajapaksa said as Prime Minister Modi was in the country. Rajapaksa lost the Jan 8 presidential election to Maithripala Sirisena.

Modi also met leaders of the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress to "discuss development cooperation opportunities", External affairs ministry spokesperson Syed Akbaruddin tweeted.

Modi attended a reception hosted by the Indian High Commissioner Y.K.Sinha before emplaning for New Delhi.

"Amazing atmosphere at the reception hosted by Indian High Commissioner in Colombo. PM is interacting with guests," said a PMO tweet.