Courtesy Ceylon Today

An officer attached to the United States (US) Embassy in Sri Lanka has taken several Sri Lankan Judges for a seminar in the US with the intention of interfering with the affairs of the Courts, United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA) Parliamentarian Udaya Gammanpila alleged yesterday (8).

Gammanpila made this allegation during the Adjournment debate on the current security situation in the country.

He claimed, The US is trying to intervene with local affairs by manipulating our Courts. The US Embassy in Sri Lanka recently organized a seminar for Sri Lankan Judges in the US. The topic of that seminar is ‘Money Laundering and the Recovery of Stolen Assets’. It was facilitated by the US Justice Department and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Nine senior Judges participated in this seminar. They are Supreme Court (SC) Judges, Justices Buwaneka Aluwihare PC, Priyantha Jayawardena PC and Vijith Kumara Malalgoda PC, Court of Appeal Judges, Justices A.H.M.D. Nawaz, Janak de Silva and N. Bandula Karunarathna, and High Court Judges Sampath Wijeratne, Sampath Abeykoon and Champa Janaki Rajaratne. The Coordinator of the seminar, named Patrick Tillou, who is an officer at the US Embassy in Sri Lanka, during a dinner had reportedly asked these Judges as to what would happen to the case of former Chief of Staff of Opposition Leader Mahinda Rajapaksa, Gamini Senarath. The Judges replied that that case is a weak one. Then Patrick had said, ‘we hope you would give a ruling which would set an example for all the senior State officers. Now, who is this ‘we’? ‘We’ means the US Government. Patrick did not stop there. He asked what the reasons were for the delay in the case related to former Defence Secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa. The Judges said that Rajapaksa files appeals with the Supreme Court against their rulings. Patrick requested them to give a final verdict on those cases as soon as possible. What is this? Patrick advised our Judges.”

Gammanpila further claimed that a patriotic Judge who was present on that occasion had recorded the entire conversation out of anger in his mobile phone. I have a copy of that recording. But I won’t table it as there is sensitive information in it,” he added.

Ceylon Today yesterday sought a response from the US Embassy with regard to the claims made by Gammanpila in Parliament. At the time of going into press, no response was received with regard to the query sent in this regard via electronic mail to Spokesperson of the US Embassy in Sri Lanka, Nancy VanHorn.