Lankan soldier arrested for attack on newspaper editor a decade ago

A soldier has been arrested in Sri Lanka for attacking the editor of a popular Sinhala language newspaper 10 years ago, police said Monday.

The corporal was arrested after his finger prints matched with those in the editor's car.

Upali Tennakoon, the editor of Rivira newspaper, was brutally attacked along with his wife in January 2009, two weeks after the killing of Lasantha Wickrematunga, the editor of The Sunday Leader.

Tennakoon and his wife were attacked as they were driving to office.

A gang of unidentified persons assaulted the couple after surrounding their car.

Tennakoon has been living in the US since the assault.

The incident was one of the attacks against media during the former regime of then president Mahinda Rajapaksa between 2005 and 2015.

The arrest came after the Attorney General's instructions on June 27, the police said.

The attacks on media people during the Rajapaksa regime were blamed on an alleged military intelligence group operating form a camp in central Colombo.

Five more from the group had been previously indicted and granted bail on the murder of Wickrematunga and abductions and assault on two other journalists.

During the Rajapaksa regime, Sri Lanka was ranked as one of the worst places in the world for journalists.