Faraz Shauketaly, 54, a reporter with the privately run newspaper Sunday Leader whose editor was shot dead in 2009, was rushed to hospital for surgery following the midnight attack at his home, according to his colleagues.[break]
"Investigations are underway," police said in a statement without elaborating.
At least three gunmen stormed into the reporter´s house in the tourist resort area of Mount Lavinia, a suburb of Colombo, and opened fire, a colleague said.
Shauketaly was rushed to hospital where doctors carried out emergency surgery.
"We are told his condition is stable," added the colleague, who asked not to be identified.
In the recent past, Shauketaly had been investigating reports of alleged corruption in Sri Lanka´s energy sector.
Media rights groups accuse Sri Lanka´s government of trying to silence dissenting voices in a country where 17 journalists and media workers have been killed in the past decade. No one has been brought to justice for the killings.
In January 2009, the editor of the Sunday Leader, Lasantha Wickrematunge, was shot dead near his office by gunmen on motorcycles. He had been a fierce critic of the government led by President Mahinda Rajapakse.
Attacks against journalists and news outlets have continued despite the end of the decades-long war between the military and Tamil Tiger separatist rebels in 2009.
There has also been a string of attacks against the main Tamil newspaper in the island´s north with employees beaten up by unidentified attackers.
Sri Lanka lifted a state of emergency in August 2011, but media rights groups say journalists have been forced to self-censor their work due to fear of physical attacks.
The investigative Sunday Leader until mid-2012 had been strongly anti-government and regularly lampooned politicians.
But the newspaper was purchased by a Sri Lankan businessman who is regarded as being staunchly in favour of Rajapakse´s administration.
In September, the newspaper´s new owner dismissed the editor, Frederica Jansz, who had replaced Wickrematunge. Jansz she said she was fired after she resisted demands from the new proprietor to water down criticism of the president.
She has since fled to Canada after saying that she had received threats to her life.
Related story
Foreign Minister Paudyal discusses connectivity issue with Sri...
-1200x560-1779450784.webp)
