Colombo, Feb 14 (Emirates 247) :  - A 14-year-old girl, who had come to the Galle town after a dispute with her mother, has been raped by nine men at a Buddhist temple in Hikkaduwa and in a lodge in Thalpe, according to information received by the Habaraduwa police, ‘Riviera’ reported.

Police said that the teenage girl was a resident of Embilipitiya and came to Galle on February 4 after a dispute with her mother.

When the girl was trying to call home from a phone booth, a young person, who came about the booth, befriended her by offering up his mobile telephone and then took her to Galle Fort and the temple in Hikkaduwa, and raped her.

Afterwards the youth left her at the Galle bus stand, and another person is believed to have raped her in a hotel in Thalpe. Six other persons are then accused of raping her in the same hotel.

Her relatives received a tip-off that the girl was in the hotel and they went there with the Habaraduwa police and found her.

After the police arrested the young man from the Galle bus stand, they have also identified the other seven men from Thalpe.

The youth, police have revealed, claimed that a Buddhist monk of the temple where the youth had taken her, also raped her.