Sri Lanka ruling party to nominate Wickremesinghe for president

Sri Lanka's ruling party will nominate acting President Ranil Wickremesinghe for president when the crisis-hit country's parliament elects a new leader next week, a party official said on Friday.

"We have decided to back Ranil Wickremesinghe as our presidential candidate," Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) General Secretary Sagara Kariyawasam told Reuters.

The party is dominated by the family of former President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, who fled Sri Lanka on Thursday after unrest triggered by the country's worst economic crisis in seven decades.