Police chief blames president for failing to prevent SL attacks
Posted on June 2nd, 2019

Courtesy The Daily Mirror

In the petition submitted to court last week and seen by AFP Sunday, Jayasundara said the country’s premier spy agency, the State Intelligence Service (SIS), ordered him last year to stop ongoing police investigations into Islamic militants. The head of the SIS, Nilantha Jayawardena, did not take seriously the intelligence shared by neighbouring India which warned of an impending attack by the NTJ.

Sri Lanka’s suspended police chief has petitioned the Supreme Court, accusing President Maithripala Sirisena of failing to prevent the Easter bombings that killed 258 people, the AFP reported today.

In a 20-page complaint, Inspector-General Pujith Jayasundara disclosed serious communication gaps between intelligence agencies and security arms of the government, all which fall under Sirisena.

In the petition submitted to court last week and seen by AFP Sunday, Jayasundara said the country’s premier spy agency, the State Intelligence Service (SIS), ordered him last year to stop ongoing police investigations into Islamic militants.

The SIS, which reports directly to President Sirisena, wanted the police Terrorist Investigation Department to stop all inquiries into extremist Muslim factions, including the National Thowheeth Jama’ath (NTJ), which was blamed for the Easter Sunday bombings.

Jayasundara said the head of the SIS, Nilantha Jayawardena, did not take seriously the intelligence shared by neighbouring India which warned of an impending attack by the NTJ.

Jayasundara said despite the SIS not sharing information warnings with the police department, he had initiated action to alert his senior men, but he had no input from the main spy agency.

President Sirisena suspended Jayasundara after he refused to accept responsibility for the deadly attacks. The Attorney General has asked for a full bench of the apex court to decide the case.

Jayasundara said he was offered a diplomatic post if he took the fall and stepped down, but he refused as he said he was not responsible for the catastrophic intelligence failure.

He said he had been sidelined by the president since a political rift between the President and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe emerged in October.

Jayasundara’s petition came days after Sirisena publicly rebuked another intelligence official, Sisira Mendis, after he told a parliamentary panel that the Easter suicide bombings could have been avoided.

Mendis’s testimony appeared to put Sirisena in a poor light by implying he had not held National Security Council meetings to review threats such as the attacks carried out by Islamic State.

In a statement, President Sirisena denied claims by Mendis that the country’s highest security body had not met as often as it should have around the time of the attacks, which were blamed on Islamic State-backed militants.

President Sirisena, who is also defence minister, said in a statement he held NSC meetings twice a week, contradicting Mendis who told parliament the last meeting was on February 19, more than two months before the April 21 bombings targeting three churches and three luxury hotels.

President Sirisena said he met with the national police chief and his top brass 13 days before the Easter Sunday attacks and no officer raised warnings which had been relayed by India.

Sri Lanka has been under a state of emergency since the attacks, but President Sirisena announced last week that it will end in a month.(AFP)

5 Responses to “Police chief blames president for failing to prevent SL attacks”

  1. Hiranthe Says:

    Don’t know who is the lier here.

    But we know very well Sirisena is a BIG LIER.

    He should be punished for the suffering of 1000’s of people affected by this pathetic psychopath suicide bombing.

    More than that, if anything happen to Ven Ratana, My3 will be in big trouble.

    I strongly feel that they are leaving this issue to explode so the people will go crazy and create havoc paving the path for American Military to walk into the Island. Our army is nothing in front of them without all our heavy weapons dumped into the deep see by this Yahapalana mad dogs My3 and Runnil.

    This look like a part of the big plan.

  2. aloy Says:

    The old fox JRJ had the presigned letters of all his MPs in his pocket and signed the pact with Rajiv Ganghi, and nothing happened to him. In this Security Council meeting everybody sitting there knew exactly what the ex-GS wanted and were afraid to speak a word about the impending danger. All were “yes sir, no sir, three bag full sir” people. The whole country witnessed it before. Nothing will happen to them also.

    If we keep current parliamentary system very soon the Sinhalas will disappear from the face of the earth.

  3. Hiranthe Says:

    Now it is 10:00am in SL.

    Ven Nanasara’s ultimatum in two hours. What will happen is a worry. I can’t trust him as I always suspected him to have an hidden agenda from his body language. (same goes with Nagananda)

    Anything else is reversible or manageable except for American forces step into our land. It is the biggest threat Mother Lanka has right now.

  4. Dilrook Says:

    American forces are coming to Sri Lanka one way or the other. Now it is 12 years too late to stop them. I don’t intend to get into a political party/clan discussion. This is how colonialists operates. Like the camel story.

    Sri Lanka is not in a position to say no to USA because we depend on USA and NATO for most of our exports and USA’s middle eastern allies (ISIS allies) for almost all our regular remittances. Any restriction on any of these is the end of Sri Lanka.

    So USA doesn’t need to use violence or create riots or anything to invade. They only need to send the marines and Sri Lanka will not raise any opposition. In fact, our 226 will say it was a blessing after UUSA has taken position in the island. Each party knows the party that confronts the Americans will be gone from within.

    If we really resist, Americans will split the island and base their military in a part ruled by their pawns. And don’t forget how our minorities will love it.

    e.g. Kosovo, East Timor, Moldova, South Korea

    What we now need is a Plan B – how to survive with American troops in the island and how to change the SOFA deal least damaging to us.

    The real danger is not riots but confronting/disrupting American plans. They are hell bent on their plans and would not allow Sri Lanka to stand in their way now.

  5. Dilrook Says:

    It’s game over for Sirisena. He should remove the 3 immediately. The entire Kandy city and even parts of elsewhere are in lockdown in support of venerable Rathana. This is going to be a national movement unless Sirisena removes them now. The basic question will be Sirisena or them.

    JHU has once again become the kingmakers of the presidential election for the third time (2005, 2015 and 2019). They earned it.

Leave a Reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.

 

 


Copyright © 2024 LankaWeb.com. All Rights Reserved. Powered by Wordpress