Colombo (AFP) - Sri Lanka has detained a female British tourist for having a Buddha tattoo on her right arm and ordered her deportation, police said Tuesday. 
 
 The unidentified woman was arrested at the country's main international airport on Monday and appeared before a magistrate who ordered her deportation, police said in a statement. 
 
 The statement said she had an image of the Buddha seated on a lotus flower tattooed on her right arm. 
 
 "She was taken before the Negombo magistrate who ordered her to be detained prior to deportation," it said, adding that she was arrested shortly after her arrival on a flight from neighbouring India. 
 
 It did not say what charges were brought against her, but Sri Lanka barred another British tourist from entering the island in March last year for showing "disrespect" to Buddhism by having a Buddha tattooed on his arm. 
 
 Sri Lanka, a majority Buddhist nation, is highly sensitive to perceived threats to the religion. 
 
 In August 2012, three French tourists were sentenced to six months in jail, which was suspended for five years, for kissing a Buddha statue in what the authorities considered was a sign of disrespect. 
 
 Sri Lanka prevented US rap star Akon from visiting in 2010 over one of his music videos which featured scantily clad women dancing in front of a Buddha statue. 
 
 It was not immediately clear where the detained British woman would be deported to. 

 A British tourist is to be deported from Sri Lanka, after she was arrested at Bandaranaike International Airport in the capital Colombo for having a tattoo of Buddha on her arm. 
 
 Naomi Michelle Coleman had arrived at the airport from India, and was detained when the tattoo of a Buddha seated on a lotus flower was spotted on her right arm, according to Sri Lankan police officials. 
 
 After her arrest Coleman, appeared before a magistrate who ordered her deportation, which will take place “very soon…tomorrow or the day after tomorrow,” a police spokesman said. 
 
 He added that the 37-year-old was arrested for “hurting others' religious feelings”. 
 
 Buddhism is the religion of the country's majority ethnic Sinhalese and tattoos using Buddhist iconography are regarded as culturally insensitive. 
 
 Her arrest follows a ban imposed in 2011 by Thailand's Culture Ministry which ruled that foreign tourists in Sri Lanka should be barred from getting tattoos of Buddha. 
 
 A Sri Lankan sweeper cleans in front of a Buddha statue in Colombo, the city where Ms Coleman was arrested. 
 
 In 2010, R&B star Akon was refused a Sri Lankan visa and had to apologise to Sri Lankan Buddhists after his video for Sexy Chick, which featured a pool party in front of a Buddha statue, caused offence and protests in the nation. 
 
 A spokeswoman for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office confirmed they were dealing with the case of a detained British national. 
 
 She said: "We are aware of the detention of a British national in Sri Lanka on April 21. We are providing consular assistance." 
 
 Additional reporting by PA
– A British woman learned the hard way that it's not a good idea to visit Sri Lanka if you have a visible Buddha tattoo. Tourist Naomi Michelle Coleman, 37, was arrested after arriving from India at Sri Lanka's main international airport yesterday; she was taken before a judge, who ordered her to be deported. The tattoo, on her right arm, shows the Buddha sitting on a lotus flower, AFP reports. Sri Lanka has a Buddhist majority, and a police spokesperson says she was detained for "hurting others' religious feelings," the Independent notes. She's expected to be deported within days; the same thing happened to a male tourist last year.