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In his first national address since protests began last month, he offered to cede some of the presidency’s power to parliament, but set no timetable.

Sri Lankans who have been calling for him to resign over an unprecedented economic crisis were unimpressed.

Many said the speech failed to address the real issues.

“Where were you for the last 30 days? People don’t have medicine, people don’t have food, the entire country’s at a standstill,” Kavindya Thennakoon, a protester in Colombo, told the BBC.

“The reforms he’s suggesting are not what we need. What we need right now is for [the president] to resign from office… It baffles my mind that Gotabaya Rajapaksa doesn’t understand that.”

On social media, many referred to the resignation of Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa – the president’s brother – earlier this week as they called for him to quit too. “One down. One more to kick out,” read one tweet on Thursday morning.

“You should have advised your ministers and your own brother Mahinda against influencing their goons to initiate a wave of terror. If not for their stupidity, Sri Lanka would not have experienced a wave of violence,” another tweet read.

Weeks of peaceful protests against the government turned violent on Monday, after supporters of Mahinda Rajapaksa attacked anti-government demonstrators and destroyed two protest sites where thousands had congregated.

Though the older Rajapaksa brother quit as PM shortly after, angry mobs have since been targeting property belonging to the family and other politicians supporting them.

Violence was reported on both Monday and Tuesday nights. Shops near Colombo were torched, as well as a resort owned by one of Mahinda’s sons.

The two-time former president is now holed up in a naval base in the north-east of the country for his own safety, the military has confirmed.

Security forces are deployed across Sri Lanka with orders to shoot looters on sight.

Gotabaya Rajapaksa made no mention of the role of pro-government supporters in triggering the violence, only condemning the actions of the mobs and vowing to bring down the full force of the law against them.

A nationwide curfew that shut shops, businesses and offices was lifted for a few hours on Thursday morning, but will be reimposed in the afternoon.

The BBC’s Anbarasan Ethirajan, in Colombo, reports that residents started lining up outside petrol stations even before the curfew was lifted. More vehicles could be seen on the roads as people rushed out to buy essentials.

Sri Lankans are desperate as basic items like food and fuel run out or become unaffordable.

Its dire financial situation has caused the Sri Lankan rupee to plunge, provoking severe shortages of basic items such as food, fuel and medical supplies.

The government blames the Covid pandemic, which all but killed off Sri Lanka’s tourist trade – one of its biggest foreign currency earners.

It also says tourists were frightened off by a series of deadly bomb attacks on churches three years ago.

However, many experts say economic mismanagement is to blame.

There is a great deal of anger against the Rajapaksa family. Many people believe Mahinda Rajapaksa paved the way for his relatives to plunder the country’s wealth for their own financial gain.

All the president’s brothers, as well as some of his nephews, held key positions in the government before continued protests forced them to step down.

During his nationwide address, Mr Rajapaksa said he would appoint a new prime minister who commanded the majority of support in parliament, as well as a new cabinet.

He had said earlier he was holding talks with other political parties aimed at forming a unity government. But the main opposition has said it will not be part of the interim administration unless the president stands down.

At present, there is no clarity on which political parties might come together to form such a government.

The political stalemate comes as Sri Lanka attempts to iron out a bailout package with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) – the island’s $81bn economy is near bankruptcy.

It has suspended its foreign debt payments, largely because it cannot service loans from China that paid for massive infrastructure projects.

While the pandemic hit the vital tourism sector and shrank Sri Lanka’s earnings and foreign exchange reserves, experts say problems have been exacerbated by populist tax cuts in 2019 and a disastrous ban on chemical fertilisers in 2021 that devastated crop yields.

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson visited both countries to sign the deals, amid debate about them joining Nato.

The pacts also state that Finland and Sweden would assist the UK in a crisis.

Mr Johnson and Swedish PM Magdalena Andersson said co-operation was “even more important” given Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The second deal was announced in a joint press conference with Finnish President Sauli Niinistö.

Mr Johnson said the “solemn declaration” between the UK and Finland was reflective of the “extreme difficulty of the times we are in”.

He emphasised the deal was “not a short-term stop gap” while Finland considered whether to join the Nato defensive alliance, but rather a “enduring assurance between two nations”.

Asked if there would be “British boots on the ground” in Finland should a conflict break out, Mr Johnson said military assistance would be offered, but that the “nature of that assistance” would depend upon the “request of the other party”.

Mr Johnson added the agreement would become the “foundation of an intensification of our security and our defence relationship in other ways as well”.

Mr Niinistö said his nation appreciated the UK’s “strong support” of Nato’s open-door policy to Finland’s potential membership.

He said joining Nato would not be “against anybody” and the UK deal was intended to “maximise our security one way or another” while considering joining the defensive alliance.

However, when asked if the possible move could provoke President Vladimir Putin, Mr Niinistö said Russia would be responsible if Sweden or Finland joined Nato.

He said Russia was suggesting the two nations did not have their “own will” by threatening them against applying for membership.

“They are ready to attack their neighbouring country, so… my response would be that ‘you caused this – look at the mirror'”.

Speaking earlier in Sweden Mr Johnson said: “If Sweden were attacked and looked to us for help and support, then we would provide it.”

Asked by the BBC to spell out exactly what the UK would do if Russia attacked Sweden, Mr Johnson said the deal meant that “upon request from the other party, we would come to the other party’s assistance”.

Ms Andersson argued her country would be safer as a result of the mutual assistance agreement with the UK, adding: “Of course this means something. This is important whatever policy choice we make in Sweden.”

She also explained the country was “exploring all possible options and Nato is one of them that is on the table”.

Finland says applying to join Nato is all about defence. But Vladimir Putin doesn’t see it that way. He’s always viewed Nato’s eastern expansion as a threat.

Finland shares an 800 mile (1300km) long border with Russia, bringing the alliance’s military might that much closer Moscow.

Finnish and Swedish membership will make Nato more robust too – boosting its eastern flank and presence in the Baltic Sea. And the Kremlin has threatened retaliation.

Some fear it might deploy targeted nuclear weapons. But Finnish diplomats I’ve spoken to believe Russia has its military hands full in Ukraine and that it will instead focus on cyber and disinformation campaigns.

They say President Putin has himself to blame for Nato expanding. Before Russia invaded Ukraine, most Finns and Swedes preferred to work alongside, but not inside, Nato.

Russia’s aggression – its expansionist zeal – changed all that.

The agreements with Sweden and Finland are not a legal or automatic security guarantee but a political declaration that the UK would come to their aid, if requested.

In an interview with the UnewsUK, Mr Johnson described the deal with Sweden as stating something that “should be implicit” in the countries’ relationship anyway.

Asked if he thought Sweden should join Nato, Mr Johnson said it was “not for the UK to intervene” in their internal debate over whether to apply to become a member of the alliance.

But he added: “We would strongly support Sweden’s accession, if that’s what the Swedes chose to do. We’d certainly try to make things go smoothly and easily as possible.”

Nato – the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation – is a 30-nation defensive alliance founded shortly after the end of World War Two.

It has its headquarters in Brussels, but is dominated by the massive military and nuclear missile power of the US.

Support for joining the Nato has increased in both Sweden and Finland since Russia invaded Ukraine, despite their long history of pursuing policies of military neutrality to avoid conflict with regional powers.

Finland and Sweden are both modern, democratic countries that fulfil the criteria for membership.

Nato’s chief, secretary general Jens Stoltenberg, has said the alliance would welcome them with open arms and there would be minimum delay in processing their membership.

Russia has previously warned both nations not to join Nato and threatened “a military technical response” if they do try to become members.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov stressed that Moscow would have to “rebalance the situation” with its own measures if any bid went ahead.

The economy contracted by 0.1% in March after no growth in February, the Office for National Statistics said.

In the first three months of the year the economy grew by 0.8%, which was driven by hospitality and travel industries recovering from coronavirus pandemic restrictions.

The ONS said the motor industry in particular was “struggling”.

The Bank of England has warned the UK faces a “sharp economic slowdown”, with prices rising at their fastest rate for 30 years, driven by soaring fuel, food and energy costs.

The Bank has forecast that inflation – the rate at which prices rise – could reach more than 10% by the end of the year.

“You can see the cost of living really beginning to bite,” said Darren Morgan, director of economic statistics at the ONS.

He added that trade in the retail sector had fallen “well below expectations”, with people cutting spending on “big ticket, non-essential sales”.

Mr Morgan also said March saw a large fall in fuel sales as people reduced the amount of car journeys they took due to the high cost of fuel at the pumps, driven by soaring global oil prices.

“The other industry we saw very much struggling is the motor trade industry. They are really struggling at the moment,” he said.

The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders has said March marked the “weakest” for new car registrations since 1998, as supply chain problems continue to hamper carmakers.

The ONS said a 15.1% fall in repairs of motor vehicles and motorcycles was the main factor behind the UK’s services sector shrinking in March.

However, it said the construction industry saw a strong month due to repairs needing to be carried out on homes and buildings following storms across in the UK in February.

The attorney general’s office said previous advice saying the opposite had changed because the agreement between the UK and EU is causing social unrest.

This means there could be new legislation scrapping checks on goods going from Britain to Northern Ireland.

The UK and EU are set to hold talks later to tackle the escalating dispute.

The new legal advice given to Attorney General Suella Braverman could allow the UK to make good on its repeated threats to scrap contentious parts of the agreement made with Brussels called the Northern Ireland Protocol.

Designed to avoid the need for a hard border with the Republic of Ireland, the deal came into force in 2021 and imposed checks on goods moving between Britain and Northern Ireland – angering unionists, who claimed it had made a border in the Irish Sea instead.

The Times, which first reported the change in legal advice, said the attorney general argued that signs of violence – such as a hoax bomb attack targeting Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney in March – justified the UK overriding the deal to keep the peace.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Wednesday that “the most important agreement is the 25-year-old Belfast Good Friday Agreement”, which set up a cross-community power-sharing government as a way of ending decades of violence.

He said the Northern Ireland protocol failed to command cross-community support and “we need to sort it out”.

But Mr Johnson also said there should not be any need for “drama” over making changes to the deal.

The process of changing the trade arrangements is likely to take more than a year, with the House of Lords expected to try to block and delay the government’s legislation.

A stand-off which emerged out of the Northern Ireland Assembly election has increased the urgency, however.

The Democratic Unionist Party – which came second in the poll after Sinn Féin and backs continuing the union between Great Britain and Northern Ireland – is refusing to nominate ministers to help form a new executive until its issues with the trade protocol are tackled.

The election established a majority for assembly members who support the protocol, with Republican Sinn Féin as the largest party for the first time.

But under the rules of the Northern Ireland Assembly, Sinn Féin cannot nominate a first minister without a unionist deputy minister.

Foreign Secretary Liz Truss, who has said she would not shy away from “taking action to stabilise the situation in Northern Ireland”, is due to hold talks with the vice-president of the European Commission on Thursday morning.

She is expected to tell Maros Sefcovic in a call that the dispute cannot be allowed to drag on.

The EU proposed changes to the protocol in October, focused on reducing inspections of food products in particular, but Ms Truss has rejected this plan.

Because of grace periods, the protocol is not yet being fully implemented, so the UK has argued that the changes being proposed would actually increase checks and controls, leading to “everyday items disappearing from the shelves”.

Mr Sefcovic has previously called on the UK to “dial down the rhetoric” and to “be honest” about what it committed to when it signed up to the protocol.