Two hundred and ninety people died in a spree of Easter Sunday bombings in Sri Lanka. On Monday, a spokesperson for Asos confirmed that three of them were children of Anders Holch Povlsen, the billionaire behind the online fashion retailer.
The spokesperson did not identify which of Povlsen’s four children had died and said, “We ask that the family’s privacy is respected at this time.” Per CNN, Holch Povlsen was on vacation in Sri Lanka with his family at the time of the attacks. Holch Povlsen is worth $5.7 billion, and is Denmark’s wealthiest man, according to Forbes. Not only is he the largest stakeholder in Asos, he is the CEO of the retail chain Bestseller and one of the largest landowners in Scotland. He and his wife own 200,000 acres in the Scottish Highlands, which they plan to preserve.
Suicide bombers targeted churches and restaurants in five-star hotels in three cities. A shopkeeper who was near the blast at St. Anthony’s Shrine in Colombo told the New York Times, “It was a river of blood.” Almost all of the victims were Sri Lankan. Nearly 300 people have died and 450 were injured.
The National Thowheeth Jama’ath, a radical Islamist organization, is believed to have been behind the attacks. Within hours, 24 suspects were arrested. Security agencies had known that the group had been planning attacks on Catholic churches and had been “closely watching them” in the days before the attack, according to the Times.