By ; A.A.M.NIZAM – MATARA

The foreign servile Ranil Wickremesinghe has acknowledged in an interview with Susan Ormisten of the CBC News when he was asked as to why, as prime minister, he did not known about repeated serious warnings, he has  accepted accountability and said: My being aware is separate from the fact that the security system had failed to implement it — some of them didn’t take it seriously (his usual habit of evading responsibility and blaming others) and has shamelessly said that government machinery was faulty and warnings from intelligence agencies were not implemented before the Easter Sunday attacks  

Wickremesinghe said that for the next few days or weeks, he worries most is that one of those individuals may not turn up in surveillance inquiries or isn’t detained before acting independently may commit suicide by blasting himself in public. (an absurf statement and a deliberate attempt to incriminate the dedicated security services personnel who are carrying out a dedicated service round the clock under immense threat to their own life.  Where on earth, the terrorist suspects or potential terrorist voluntarily turns up to get himself subjected to surveillance? It is shame to find this kind of an imbecile functioning as the Prime Minister of our country)”

The interviewer said that Sri Lankan security officials warned lawmakers on 4^th April almost two weeks before the attacks and asked why these warnings were ignored by the government and kept only the Christians of the government inform therebypreventing them getting caught in the carnage? Evading direct response to the question, Mr. Wickremasinghe said that in future they have to put into effective measures to ensure it doesn’t happen again, that information comes to be acted upon.”

 But pressed as to why, as prime minister, he did not know about repeated serious warnings, he accepted accountability and acknowledge  the fact that the government machinery was faulty.

”Sri Lankan Archbishop Cardinal Dr.Malcolm Ranjith criticized top leaders in government for feuding during the crisis. He said that at a time when the whole country has been affected by a major catastrophe, politicians should stop finding fault with each other.

The economic impact of the attacks could cripple the tourism industry — at least for awhile.Sri Lanka’s Tourism Bureau has warned that tourist arrivals in Colombo could drop by 50 per cent over the next two months, and with 30 per cent fewer travellers predicted according to chairman Kishu Gomes

But the prime minister who has ruined the economy of the country for the last 4 years, despite claims made by him and his butterfly cabal (including those holding commercially acquired Doctorates)   that he is an economic wizard, predicted a smaller impact in the long-term. In another bluffing he claimed that Sri Lanka is in its low tourist season now.  If that was true why he ans his butterflies claimed two weeks before that there is a steep increase in high end tourist arrivals?.  

In a photograph published by the CBC News damage from the blast surrounding a statue of St. Jude at St. Sebastian’s Church in Negombo has killed ore than 100 around this statue.

It is shameful and disgusting to note that this sadist Prime Minister has said that there was no significant community backlash causing more violence in the critical first three days after the attacks. It may be one of the reasoms that he was hiding for those three days like his uncle after black        July.   Uttering another blatant lie he has said that it was terrible when the civil war (it was not a civil war but over three decades of terrorist aggression, shamrlessly attempting to distort the truth for which he has gained notoriety) ended in 2009. It   seems that this idiotic Prime Minister edo not know what happened in the country after our gallant soldiers vanquished the terrorists.  19^TH May 2009 was the Deepavali of Sri Lanka in which people of the country devoid of party, colour, religious, and ethnic differences celebrated distributing sweets and kiribath, holding motor vehicle parades and many expressing their gratitude to Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa for ending terrorism by prostrating before him.  He was almost considered as a diety by the people with the song of Maharajanani played in full blast in the background.

Renember Mr. Wickremasinghe that you will never achieve a status like this even if you rule the country for the next 100 yearsand you will only be considered as DDon Juan Dharmapala.

While Ranil Wickremasinghe shamelesslt claim that our intelligence is not capable of dealing with what he calls the globalterrorism and the country needs international spies to face the current situation the former President and the Leader of the Opposition Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa has thanked India for the help in uncovering the extremist plot but has said  that Sri Lanka does not want any foreign forces, like the Indian National Security Guard, on its soil.

“India has been helpful. But there is no need for the NSG to come in. We don’t need foreign soldiers. Our forces are capable enough… We just need to give them powers and freedom,” he has told News18 in an exclusive interview. 

His reaction came after a government official told CNN-News18 that the elite force has been kept on standby if the island nation needed any help. 

The former president, who was involved in a soft coup attempt last year, blasted the government and said both President Maithripala Sirisena, who is also the minister of defense and in charge of national police, and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, who has been kept out of high-level security meetings since Sirisena tried to oust him last fall, were responsible for the series of blasts in which over 300 people were killed on Easter Sunday. 

“They are busy playing politics at the cost of national security. Everyone knew about the growth of radicalism. They were worried about votes and their vote bank and did not act,” Rajapaksa told News18.

News 18 saif that Elections to pick a new president are due between October and December and Rajapaksa has started targeting Sirisena and his Wickremesinghe for failing to preserve the hard-fought peace that he helped to bring by crushing the Tamil Tiger separatists. Although Rajapaksa cannot contest for president again, his brother Gotabaya is ready to make a bid, his aide has said.

India has said that it had shared very specific intelligence inputs about the Islamic State’s plans of the bombings, but the warnings had remained unheeded. 

Top officials have acknowledged that some of the intelligence units were given advance notice about the attacks — starting weeks ago and up until the morning of the bombings — but that little was done to prevent them. 

N 18 ai  that the country’s police chief Pujith Jayasundara and defense secretary Hemasiri Fernando have both have been asked to resign over their failure to prevent the blasts despite having prior intelligence.

In a tweet, PM Wickremesinghe said, “We take collective responsibility and apologize to our fellow citizens for our failure to protect victims of these tragic events.”

Mr. Rajapaksa also dismissed the PM’s view that no action could be taken against citizens who had left to join the Islamic State. “The existing laws are good enough to act against those with terror links,” he argued. 

PM Wickremesinghe said that the government had known that Sri Lankan nationals who had joined the Islamic State had returned to the country, but they could not be arrested as joining a foreign terrorist organization is not against the law.

The Islamic State group has claimed responsibility for the Easter terror attacks on three Catholic churches and three luxury hotels that claimed over 300 lives but the government has blamed a local Islamist extremist group National Tawheed Jamath (NTJ) for the bombings.

A report published by tr Island said that Archbishop of Colombo Dr.Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith has told the government, in no uncertain terms, that he is utterly displeased with the security measures adopted since the Easter Sunday attacks. He has urged the government to ensure that the armed forces and police went beyond merely acting on tip-offs. He has struck a responsive chord with the public.

The Island said rhat one cannot but endorse the prelate’s call for the government to pull all stops to remove the scourge of terror. Schools and places of worship cannot remain closed for fear of terror attacks an it is the bounden duty of the government to ensure public safety. The country was not crippled in this manner even during the height of war. It is in this predicament because national security did not figure high on the yahapalana agenda. Shaken awake by the Easter Sunday bombings, the government is now running around like a headless chicken. The police and the armed forces have been allowed to do what they should have been ordered to carry out long before the Easter tragedy.

IGP Pujitha Jayasundara has been sent on compulsory leave over the Easter Sunday incidents which the police failed to prevent in spite of intelligence warnings. Secretary of Defence Hemasiri Fernando was made to resign within a few days of the bombings.

Terrorists only have to be lucky once, and their targets have to be lucky always, as the IRA told Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, having failed to kill her. This country suffered a countless number of terror attacks, for nearly three decades, many in the city and its suburbs, while Prabhakaran was around. Thousands of people perished in them. Terrorists killed one President, in 1993, and another came very close to being blown to smithereens, six years later. The Army Headquarters was bombed and the then Army Commander Lt. Gen. Sarath Fonseka seriously injured. But the Easter Sunday blasts were different in that they could have been averted as the government had been sufficiently warned.

The Islabd report askrf is it only the IGP and the Defence Secretary who should take the blame for security lapse and queried what about the political grandees who did not care to take any action though it was brought to their notice, in Parliament, way back in 2016, that several Sri Lankan families, trained by the ISIS had returned home? When the then Justice Minister Dr. Wijeyadasa Rajapakse made that revelation, he drew heavy flak from the government MPs themselves,  .

The President and the PM claim they were not aware of the pre-Easter intelligence warning. So does Opposition Leader Mahinda Rajapaksa. Try as they might, they won’t be able to dupe the public into taking their claims seriously. The intelligence document, containing the warning, at issue, had been copied to all VVIP security divisions as a leaked image thereof shows. Some members of the Cabinet have admitted they had been aware of the danger well in advance. Are we to conclude that the President, the PM and the Opposition Leader are less informed than others the report asked.  It pointed out that the  PM has claimed that there are no laws to deal with Sri Lankans who have joined foreign terrorist groups. Some legal experts have pooh-poohed this claim, arguing that the existing laws are sufficient for action to be taken against them. Even if there had been a lacuna in the country’s laws, remedial measures should have been adopted as a national priority to arrest the terror suspects concerned. New laws could have been passed immediately.

The reports also pointed out that the 19th Amendment was passed in record time at the behest of the UNP. The FCID (Financial Crimes Investigation Division) was set up almost overnight to deal with the rivals of the yahapalana government, which dragged its feet on matters concerning national security and said that Cardinal Ranjith has proved that he is a much better leader than the self-proclaimed ones who are making a lot of noise in politics. In the immediate aftermath of the terror attacks, he intervened to defuse tension and ensure that the public acted with restraint despite the sheer magnitude of the disaster. He was, of course, assisted by other religious leaders in the noble task.

The Island emphasized let the government be urged to heed the Cardinal’s warning that the people’s patience is wearing thin and their anger might spill over into the streets unless the situation is brought under control and the remaining terrorists brought to justice forthwith.

below is a translation of the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) proposals submitted by Mr. Mahinhxda Rajapaksa at the All Party Conference inParliamrnt on 25^th April. (courtesy Lanka CNews)

The Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) extend our gratitude for calling an all party conference to discuss the situation that has arisen following the terrorists on the Easter Sunday and for inviting our party to attend this conference. We hereby submit our proposals relating to the terrorist attacks, the situation that led to these attacks, the after effects of the attacks, about the steps that need to be taken to ensure and strengthen national security and reconciliation among all communities while expressing our whole hearted readiness to extend our unhesitant and fullest cooperation for the future measures.   

Our vision as the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP)

It is our sole expectation to build the modern  Sri Lankan nation in which all Sinhala, Tamil, Muslin, Malay and Burgher could communities could live freely and harmoniously upholding theit cultural identity and with religious and ethnic freedom and reconciliation. All other rights in the human society come only after the right to live. Therefore there can be nothing above the national security. It is only within a secured society that all matters relating to ethnic cooperation and religious reconciliation that take place. The reconciliation remains within the common factor of national security.

But in the recent past an attitude showinh that there is a contradiction between national security and national reconciliation, socialized from top to bottom. This attitude showed the opinion that showing interest on national security is tantamount togo against national reconciliation.

It is like an unscientific expression saying that breathing is injurious to the heart. This condition knowingly or unknowingly and directly or indirectedly contributed to this massive tragedy.

What we urge for is to place the national security in its due place. To give its due place to the national security. To entrust the task of managing the national security to                        qualified professionals.

We did observe a sever collapse in the National Security Council and the in the institutions in charge of national security.  Immediately restructure these institutions on a scientific basis.

It is a well known fact that the State Intelligence services are being subjected to abhorrent suppression.  Due to this factor the State Intelligence services have become ineffective.

We emphatically request to immediately understand the importance of a State Intelligence service for the prevalence of a State and activate the State Intelligence service which has been inactivated.

It is only after proper scientific filtering that information collected becomes usable data

It is not gossips that data collected by a State Intelligence service..  When we analyse the recent events it becomes clear that State Intelligence data has not even received the importance given to a normal goddip.

There is no use of obtaining medicine if you do not consume it.  It is the prime responsibility of those who are in charge to utilize the State Intelligence properly.

The government should immediately analyse on steps to be taken er a national disaster.In this instance civil and leaders and the general public displayed a verty progressive behaviour. They were very much ahead of the responsible authorities. 

At this moment as there is a possibility of creating hatred on Sei Lanka Muslims and a conspiracy to shatter national unity as it was done after Black July it is the bounden duty and responsibility of the government to enhaance security for all communities

We respectfully bow down our heads in gratitude to the neighbours who rushed to assisy and help the victims, the staff of hospitals, officers of the security forces, to all disaster management services . and to the public who came forwatd to provide material and physical help d assistance.    

Sri Lanka Podejana Peramuna (SLPP).  …

(To be copntinued)  .