According to investigations Pullendran had met the RWPC whenever he came to Colombo.

The RWPC is a very close relation of Pullendran, police said.

Pullendran's wife, Mohmaed Najubdeen, the previous owner of the mini bus and Kanthan the conductor of the bus who were taken to custody by the Eravur police were sent to Colombo for further investigations.

The special police investigation team of the CDB are trying to ascertain whether the RWPC had prior knowledge about the Maradana bomb blast.

Pullendran had been a frequent visitor to Colombo, specilly to meet the RWPC, police said.

Following the Maradana bomb blast 38 persons including two policemen died and over 250 persons were injured.

The Maligakanda Magistrate who visited the police morgue directed the police to release the bodies to the next of kin and ordered the police to arrest the suspects and produce them before court.

Woman sergeant key player in Maradana bomb

A woman sergeant in the Kompannaveediya police station has emerged as the main suspect in the Maradana bomb bus tragedy, detectives said yesterday as investigators pieced the picture together.

They said there was substantial evidence that this Tamil reserve sergeant was the sister of the suspected bomb bus owner identified as Pulendran and that he had stayed with her while in Colombo.

Evidence has also been obtained that about one year ago Pulendran had been arrested by the Kandy police when he went there to work out a deal to buy a vehicle. But the woman police sergeant had intervened to get him released, the detectives said.

The bus owner who is still at large had obtained his a route permit to enter the city with assistance from the woman sergeant and a traffic police sub inspector while another top Tamil officer had also put in a word.

Police have arrested a broker identified as Nazeer who sold the bus to Pulendran. He and the woman sergeant are being fully grilled to obtain more leads.

Detectives said the woman suicide bomber who blasted herself near the Air Force check point on February 6 is also believed to have lived with the woman sergeant at Kompannaveediya.

Bus-bomb assembled in B'caloa

Investigators believe that the bus-bomb that blew up in Maradana last week had been assembled in Batticaloa, police said.

Investigations had revealed that the explosives-laden bus had been parked at Pettah bus stand before it was blown up the next day, police said.

According to some of the commuters who had travelled in this bus on its last trip from Batticaloa on March 3rd, the bus had left at dawn with a load of passengers and when the passengers questioned the driver over the inordinate delay as the bus had reached Colombo only at 9.30 p.m. that night, the driver had said that as he had broken rest the previous night he was sleepy and that is why he drove the bus slowly to Colombo, police said.

But investigators believe that the bomb had been assembled into the panels of the bus in Batticaloa and that was the reason why it was driven slowly with caution from Batticaloa to Colombo. Maradana blast, 21st bomb explosion in Colombo in recent times and govt. talks of peace

Bomb bus driver back in Tiger camp

Owner of the explosive rigged bus that was exploded at Maradana junction last Thursday, Pulendran alias Kulendran had fled Colombo for Batticaloa about seven hours before the blast.

According to security sources Pulendran who drove the bus to Colombo on March 3 with a load of passengers had sent back the conductor Thangaraj Pushpakanth to Eravur, Batticaloa the same day allegedly saying that he was staying in Colombo to attend the bus' radiator repairs.

Since fleeing Colombo Pulendran is believed to have taken refuge in the terrorist base at Kokkadicholai.

Police acting swiftly arrested Pulendran's wife and children from Eravur the same evening. Police had captured them before Pulendran could move tham to Kok-kadicholai LTTE camp. (NP)

The National Movement against Terrorism, a recently formed campaign is organising a protest and demonstration against terrorism today at the All Ceylon Buddhist Congress premises at 3 p.m.

A large and representative gathering of parents of Colombo, retired army and police officers met at the ACBC hall on Saturday March 7 to set up this organisation and decide on what steps they should take to protect their children and the citizens of Colombo, against terrorism.

At the meeting it was pointed out that the recent Maradana bomb was the 21st bomb explosion in Colombo in the last few years. With regular bomb explosions whose frequency is increasing, speakers asked what the fate of their children would be and where the next explosion would take place? In the schools, in the work places or in other places of worship?

The movement called on the citizens of Colombo to take steps to protect themselves and their children. It was emphasised that the government had failed in its responsibility to maintain law and order and bring about peace.

Tamil politicians under the protection of our police forces, living in Colombo, not in Jaffna and pose as moderates, but they are the real supporters of the LTTE terrorists, said the Ven. Sobhita Thero. They are also the supporters of the PA government. They have to be identified, isolated and dealt with by the authorities, as other supporters of terrorism are dealt with, said the Thero.

S. Thondaman, a senior Minister in the PA government is one of them, he said. At a recent meeting to mark the CWC anniversary, Thondaman demanded that the LTTE be given control of the North/East province for fifteen years. This is an improvement on the five years Thondaman demanded on behalf of the LTTE earlier, said the Ven. Sobhita Thero.

Speakers demanded that Thondaman should be removed from office as he is clearly a supporter of terrorism.

Survivor tells a remarkable tale

A man who briefly rode the killer bus that was exploded at the Maradana junction last Thursday killing over 30 has given a graphic account of the events that preceded the explosion to a Sinhala morning daily.

Nilantha Kumarasiri, 28, was an employee of G.H. Wijesiri, owner of Siri Enterprises of Panchikawatte, the owner of the jeep with which the bus first collided. Wijesiri and everybody else in the jeep that chased the white Nissan Civilian bus are now dead.

But Kumarasiri has lived to tell the tale. He got into the bus at his boss's request after the suicide killer had hit Wijesiri's jeep. Although the bus driver had attempted to settle the damage by proffering a thousand rupee note, the jeep owner had insisted on their driving to a garage and finding out what the repair would cost.

My boss told me `Nilantha, you come in the bus and I will follow by car'. That's how I boarded the bus. When I got in and tried to sit on the passenger seat by the driver, he blocked me with his arm and made me sit behind.

It all started when my boss was trying to find a parking slot near the shop. He was moving the jeep very slowly when the bus hit him. Rienzie, another employee of the shop who also died in the explosion, told me when we first saw the bus driver, "Machan, don't know whether this fellow is a Tiger''. I remembered those words in the brief moments I was in the bus.

Only the driver was on board the vehicle. He was dressed in a white shirt and a pair of blue shorts. He was a fair man who looked about 21-22-years old. Although he spoke fairly good Sinhalese, I knew he was a young Tamil.

On the passenger seat beside the driver there were four bottles of Necto, a bun and packet of Gold Leaf cigarettes. There was also a glass tube that was about 6-inches long with a diameter of about an inch. There was something small inside it but I couldn't quite see what it was.

He opened one of the Necto bottles and gulped down its contents. As he finished the drink he seemed to get new life and stopped shivering. He drove the bus forward a few metres and nearly collided with another vehicle. I demanded that he stop the bus so that I can get down. He did.

My boss came up there and told the driver `you can't drive the bus. Leave it here and you come in my jeep. We'll go to a garage close by and get an estimate of the damage to my jeep. I'll bring you back here.' But the driver said he could not come to a garage. You go and find out how much the repair would cost and come back.

My boss then said that if he claimed that the damage would cost Rs. 50,000 would the driver pay? He said `I don't have that much money. This is all I have,' and once again offered the thousand rupees. Then my boss said "this won't work, let's go to the police and reach a settlement.''

That's the moment when SI Asoka of the Maligawatte police reached the scene. Mr. Wijesiri had called the Maradana police on the phone while I was in the bus. He had been told that it will take about 15 minutes for a policeman to come to the spot because of the traffic. A message had also been sent to Maligawatte to send a policeman.

SI Asoka Perera arrived at the scene and spoke to boss. I told the SI "Sir, this man can't drive properly''. He said in that case he would take the bus to the police station and asked us to bring the driver to the police in the jeep. At that moment the driver moved the bus forward.

SI Asoka banged on the side of the bus and ordered the driver to stop. Our boss and two others from our shop got into the front seat of the jeep. I couldn't get into the jeep. I ran behind the jeep. I saw another traffic policeman from Maradana getting into it. Even as I tried to climb in myself for the second time, it pulled off.

Three minutes didn't pass as the jeep headed towards the Maradana police when there was a big bang. We thought it was a bomb. I knew only then that the bus I had ridden briefly was the "bomba bus''.

Businessmen's organisation seeks LTTE ban in West

The Peace Loving Citizens of Sri Lanka (PLCSL) will launch its second phase of collecting signatures from the public on a petition requesting the Western countries to ban the LTTE in their countries, today at several places in the Colombo City.

This was announced by the PLCSL at a press conference held at Hotel Intercontinental on Wednesday. The PLCSL is a recently established organisation comprising mainly businessmen of all three races scattered all over the country. Their main focus is to build up an opinion among local and international communities against the terror attacks unleashed on innocent civilians by the LTTE. In addition to this they observe that it is the LTTE which attacks the armed forces of the legitimate government of the country standing for peace and the government of Sri Lanka is not the perpetrator of this violence. The PLCSL is of the view that the war, if required, has to be only between the LTTE and armed forces of the government but unarmed innocent civilians should not be targeted.

"On January 29,1998 an appeal had been made by the PLCSL to governments of Britain, France and Australia through their embassies to ban the LTTE and prevent LTTE fund raising in their respective countries. Only the Prime Minister of Australia has reacted to the appeal by sending a reply. The letter of the Aussie Prime Minister said, "Our (Australian) security and law enforcement agencies monitor groups they suspect may be breaching the law. There has been no conclusive evidence to date which has led to prosecution under the legislation that make it an offence to finance terrorism acts in other countries. If you have specific information which points to terrorist activities, you should contact the Australian High Commission in Colombo so that appropriate investigations can be made," the members of the PLCSL said.

"The LTTE has demonstrated over and over again through their dastardly attacks on unarmed civilians, assassinations, mass murders, bombing of private and public property, act of ethnic cleansing etc. that they are a genocidal group of criminals. The U.S.A. which has taken the lead in combating international terrorism very rightly identified the LTTE as a terrorist group and has outlawed them. The LTTE is possibly the most vicious and dangerous terrorist organisation in the world today. Though the U.S.A. has been pro-active in recognising the heinous nature of the LTTE, other Western countries notably Britain have turned a blind eye on the LTTE activities on their soil".

"The LTTE is surviving solely because of the flow of funds and other resources from the Western world raised by the significant Tamil communities in those countries. As responsible members of the international community these nations have an obligation to humanity to prevent terror support activities taking place on their soil".

They also said that the first campaign to obtain signatures to a mass petition was launched on March 6,1998 in Kandy and within two hours more than 20,000 Sri Lankans signed the petition on the streets of Kandy.

"It is very likely that more than ten million Sri Lankans will be eager to sign the petition but however due to practical difficulties in reaching all of them within a short period of time, we will collect the maximum possible and present the petition to the governments of Britain, France, Germany, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Switzerland, Australia and Canada on or before June 10, 1998.

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