{"id":88977,"date":"2019-05-17T16:12:40","date_gmt":"2019-05-17T23:12:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=88977"},"modified":"2019-05-17T16:12:40","modified_gmt":"2019-05-17T23:12:40","slug":"easter-sunday-bomb-blast-in-sri-lanka-part-6","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2019\/05\/17\/easter-sunday-bomb-blast-in-sri-lanka-part-6\/","title":{"rendered":"EASTER SUNDAY BOMB BLAST IN SRI LANKA Part 6"},"content":{"rendered":"

KAMALIKA PIERIS<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

This essay provides additional information on\nmatters which have been discussed in the earlier essays. We start with the\ninvestigations into the Easter Sunday bombings <\/p>\n\n\n\n

ITEM 1<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

 \u2018Praying Mantis\u2019 tells us what the government\nshould have done immediately after the bomb blasts. The government should have immediately\nimposed an indefinite island-wide curfew, declared a state of emergency,\nbrought the tri-forces and the police out of their barracks and encouraged them\nto use all available intelligence information . The sympathizers, henchmen,\nsupportive politicians and all those connected even remotely with the bomb\nblasts should have been promptly and rapidly rounded up. What we needed was\nstrong, vibrant and crucial leadership. What we got was the exact opposite;\nweak, half dead and cannot-care-less types.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Most of the armed forces are still in the\nbarracks, only less than half of the available personnel are being used. Yet\nfor all that, what they have achieved is mind-boggling and totally\noverwhelming. They have risen to the occasion like never before. They have had\naccess to a considerable amount of intelligence information,  and they have rounded up many  criminals from right round the country. They\ngot the lot from even unheard of locations in the wild,  said Praying Mantis\u2019.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

ITEM 2<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Merril Guneratne has  looked at the \nintelligence  sector. The State\nIntelligence Service (SIS) had a period of at least  two years to become aware of the clandestine\nactivities of the terror groups. There was the \ndesecration of Buddhist temples in Kegalle and the murder of policemen\nin Vavunativu. These two operations should have acted as alarm signals  pointing to  an emerging terror movement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gunaratne places  the blame firstly on  the Head of the SIS. The SIS should have prepared and sent a\nreport  containing the intelligence to\nthe government and Secretary of Defense. Secretary of Defence  should thereafter have convened a security\nconference, to  assess the threat,\nconsider security safeguards, and seek the approval of the President for their\nenforcement. After that there should have been a conference of the Chief of\nDefense Staff,( CDS), service commanders and the IGP, along with Chief of National\nIntelligence and Director of SIS, to discuss the threat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His inability to do so has been a grave\nomission. This may have been due to his ignorance and inexperience in matters\nconnected with national security. The Chief of national Intelligence, like Secretary\nof Defence,  did not know anything  about intelligence and national security,\nthough  he  was at the apex of the intelligence gathering\nagency, a highly specialized and skilled field. Gunaratne pointed out that   Secretary \nof Defence ,Chief of National intelligence and director of SIS  could meet President and the Minister of\nDefence    at any time,  to discuss urgent  matters regarding national security.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I think there is considerable merit in the\nadvocacy of Wijeyadasa Rajapaksha for an investigation for criminal neglect,\nsaid Gunaratne  There would have been many telephone calls  between Secretary of Defence, IGP, Chief of\nnational Intelligence and Director of SIS concerning  the intelligence received from India. Did\nSecretary of Defence and IGP consult Director, SIS and CNA as to the nature of\nthe threat foreseen by Indian intelligence. Telephone conversations and off\nthe record” discussions, should be included in such a probe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

ITEM 3<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The speed with which the Police, STF and Armed\nservices swung into action following the explosions, despite their initial\nfailing, is commendable, said Gamini Gunawardene. They seemed to know where to\nstrike no sooner than the green light was given. Within hours, the police\nvisited the most vulnerable spot in Dematagoda, and the three police officers\nand also the pregnant wife and children of the prime suspect blew themselves\ninto smithereens. Security Forces with STF then raided the right places in\nSammanthurai, Kalmunai and Katthankudy with devastating results. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Army\u2019s Intelligence arm had collected the\ninformation, using systems that were upgraded during the near three decade long\nseparatist war, reported the media. The \nintelligence work started when five Muslim youth joined the ISIS  in July 2015 together with their immediate\nfamilies, numbering 34.  This came to\nlight after a person identified as Nilam was killed in combat in Syria. The\nclosely knit group\u2019s 34 members had been moving between Iraq and Syria and\nlater operating in Syria. It transpired that an IS \u2018military\u2019 instructor came\nto Sri Lanka and circulated on the internet various messages to Muslim youth,\nindoctrinating them in ISIS ideology. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Army began monitoring one of these  groups. The comments posted showed they\nendorsed IS ideology and had been \ninfluenced by the propaganda. Views expressed were extremist. It is this\ngroup that morphed into Jamiathul Millathul Ibrahim (JMI). It was headed by Umar\nMohamed who is now in custody. He is spilling the beans. Towards the end of\n2017, divisions erupted in JMI. The issue was over whether they should carry\nout attacks in Sri Lanka or not. Leader Mohamed had objected and said they\nshould go and fight shoulder to shoulder with brethren\u201d in Syria. This\nin-fighting led to a breakup of the JMI. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A small group broke away and did not attend\nJMI meetings. They took up the position that they would not interfere with\nother groups.  Their policy  was live and let live.\u201d Later, they joined\nthe National Thowheed Jamaath (NTJ) which was led by Mohamed Cassim Mohamed\nZahran. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The NTJ came into being in 2016.  Before that they were known in 2012 as Sri\nLanka Thowheed Jamaath (SLTJ) and earlier as All Ceylon Thowheed Jamaath\n(ACTJ). Zahran, who was wanted by the Police went missing In March  2017. From an unknown location he kept on\nposting highly inflammatory and extremist IS material on the Internet. His\nFacebook account too contained such posts and video footage. He exhorted the\nkilling of infidels or non-Muslims. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A leadership crisis broke out in the NTJ. A\nsection accused Zahran of being a sex maniac, of misappropriating money and\nbeing exceedingly aggressive.  Yet, he was backed by the majority. In his\nabsence Thowfeek Mowlavi became acting leader. Some investigators believe\nZahran went to South India through illegal means and was hiding there. However,\nthey have no evidence to confirm this. Joining them was a third person \u2013\nMohamed Nowfer from Qatar. He has been posting IS materials directed at Sri\nLankan Muslim youth when he was in Qatar. Later, in Sri Lanka, Zahran and\nNowfer together continued to upload IS video material on the internet. Nawfer\nhas now been arrested  along with another\nkey member Milshan from Saudi Arabia. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other than the hard-core cadres taught in Iraq\nand Syria, the training for local recruits had been minimal and lasted only\nthree or four days. Zahran who conducted them in areas such as Aruppola\n(Mawanella), Nuwara Eliya, Hambantota and Malwana focused on mental inculcation.\nHis brother Rilwan had been well trained in bomb manufacture and died in the\nblasts at the safe house in Sainthamaruthu. Zaharan\u2019s other brother, Zain was\nalso an explosive expert. Contrary to Police claims there have been no training\ncamps like the ones used by Tiger guerrillas. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When Zahran re-appeared, he cunningly ended\nthe leadership crisis. He circulated among Thowfeek, Naufer and Milshan a\nvideo. It said that Thowfeek, evidently a non-Sri Lankan did not have a visa.\nZahran would be the leader of the NTJ. More youth should be recruited and\ntrained. Arguments  went back and forth.\nOne side was in favor of training cadres and sending them to Syria. The other\nbacked by Zahran insisted that they should go ahead with plans to take on\ntargets in Sri Lanka. With enormous financial resources at their disposal,\nsurveillance of targets began. Police later arrested a leading tea export\nfirm\u2019s employee who held Rs 89 million in a bank account for use by extremist\nMuslim ISIS groups. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

One\nof the five members whom the Army identified in July 2015 as fighting with the\nIS was Mohamed Aroos. He has been in regular contact with Zahran by telephone\nand has been helping the latter. Aroos has since been taken into custody  by the US troops operating in Syria and is\nunder interrogation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The explosive the local bomb groups used has\nbeen confirmed as Triacetone Triperoxide or TATP, the type used by ISIS. A\nlarge stock of bomb making material and detonators, local as well as those\nsuspected to be smuggled from India after purchase in the black market, were\ndestroyed when a suicide bomber exploded himself in a hideout in Sainthamaruthu\n(Batticaloa District) when troops surrounded it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Evidence has surfaced that Zahran had plans\nfor a second wave of attacks. The wife of Haktun, the suicide bomber who\nattacked St Sebastian Church in Katuwapitiya has confirmed that large stocks of\nwhite cloth had been purchased from a shop in Giriulla. Were they for use as\npilgrims at temples or during the Vesak celebrations? There was also evidence\npointing to the likelihood of a long-term plan to use it as a disguise during\nthe Esala Perahera in Kandy. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nterrorists who carried out the Easter Sunday bombings used a Swiss developed,\nhighly encrypted mobile communication App named Threema\u201d<\/em>, The mobile phone App boasts \u2018best in the\nclass\u2019 end-to-end encryption and allows a user to generate a random Threema ID,\nthereby giving anonymity to the user. The level of encryption used by the said\nApp makes intercepting or decrypting such communications very difficult for Sri\nLankan authorities with available technologies, concluded Sunday Times<\/em> .   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

ITEM<\/strong>  4<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Azath Sally was\ninterviewed by Chandraprema in 2019. He said, Zaharan was very\npowerful  in Kattankudy \nand politicians were  scared to\ncross him. Kattankudy was a traditional Muslim village\nand the traditional Muslims were a very peaceful people. Every week there would\nbe functions at home, there would be recitals and the entire community would\nshare a meal. When these extremists came in, they said everything we were doing\nwas wrong – those gatherings, what we were reciting, and even the shared meal\nwas wrong. They had money that\nwas coming from abroad and that gave them power, said Azath.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 The Towheed Jamath movement came into\nthis country in the early 1980s and they splintered into several factions, said\nAzath. Every time money\ncame in, distribution became a problem and they broke up into splinter groups.\nSo you find several factions, called the SLTJ. CTJ. NTJ and so on. Altogether\nthere are  about ten to twelve factions.\nThe movement is limited to a small number of people. Traditional Muslims have\ngone to the police against Towheed Jamath on several occasions.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since 1994, \nI have been telling the authorities about the Zaharan group and its\nactivities, continued Azath. I  prevented\ntheir leader P. Jainulabdeen,\nhead of Tamil Nadu\nThowheed Jamath<\/a>\nfrom coming here. I told the Defence Secretary that this person\nmust not be allowed into the country. But he had already landed in Sri Lanka. This\nwas in 1995 or 1996. The police\ndeported him before he could speak at a meeting. After that he\ntried to come to Sri Lanka on three occasions. I blocked it on all three\noccasions. Now he says he wants to come to Sri Lanka for medical treatment. But\nwe have told him that people were going from Sri Lanka to India for medical\ntreatment and that he should not come here concluded Azath. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wasn\u2019t there an incident in Kattankudy where a\nmosque was demolished and the body of a Sufi leader thrown out onto the street\nasked Chandraprema. . That was done by Zaharan Hashim, replied Azath. There was\nanother incident where 120 houses were burnt down by Zaharan. There is a large\nSufi community in Kattankudy with a Sheik in charge. The Sheik was scared of\nthe NTJ  and kept silent.  Sufis are \nstill the majority in Kattankudy But they are peaceful people and they\nare afraid even to go to the police because the extremists have money to throw\naround.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Why are the mainline Muslim leaders so scared\nof these groups. Why were they reluctant to even acknowledge that a problem\nexists asked Chandraprema. All Muslim candidates who contested the Batticaloa\ndistrict signed agreements with Zaharan Hashim, replied Azath. Zaharan  imposed conditions on them saying that they\ncould not go with the Sufis and that they had to do what he told them to do. So\nfor election purposes, Hisbulla and even the Muslim Congress signed  up, fearing that they will lose elections\notherwise. They are under the thumb of these Towheed groups. Hisbulla had been\ntold that he can\u2019t light crackers or play music at meetings. He violated those\nconditions and was defeated. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

ITEM 5<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

UPFA MP Dr\nSarath Amunugama told Parliament,  that\nthe Easter Sunday attacks could not be taken lightly.  The whole country was gripped by fear. The\nschools are empty. The world regarded the Easter Sunday suicide bombings in Sri\nLanka as the biggest attack, second only to the 9\/11 attacks in the US.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the\nprevious government we had the world\u2019s best security forces and intelligence\nservices. Because former President Mahinda Rajapaksa, Defence Secretary Gotabhaya\nRajapaksa and then Army Commander Sarath Fonseka worked together, they were\nable to defeat the world\u2019s most ruthless terrorist group. But what has happened\nto the country since 2015, he asked. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since 2015\nthe security establishment had been allowed to deteriorate. “In 2017 when\ncertain Muslim factions took up arms and created trouble, the Muslim people\nbrought up the issue and even revealed the names of these persons to the\npolice. The government did nothing. This is not a weakness of the intelligence\nagencies. The government had ample information. The Muslims themselves\ncomplained,” he said, adding that the blame should first be accepted by\nthose in charge of law and order. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“My\nearnest request is for this government to resign keeping. If you don\u2019t take the\nblame, then the President should kick you out and appoint the people who have\nknowledge and form an all-party government.” Amunugama commended the\nearlier speech made by MP Sarath Fonseka and said it was a very comprehensive\nreview of the situation. “This Cabinet is like a turkey waiting for an\nearly Christmas,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

ITEM  6<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The last item in this essay is a set of\nquotations from the column Cassandra Cry\u201d. Cassandra had  this to say about the Easter Sunday bombings\n:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cass listened to Dr Rajitha Senaratna, Rauf\nHakeem and Kabir Hashim speak to the media on Monday 22 at Temple Trees where,\non behalf of the government they humbly apologized to all those who were\naffected by the bomb blasts and outlined compensation to be paid\/given, said\nCassandra <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The apology  was tendered by the spokesman of the\ngovernment, speaking more on behalf of the UNP. Dr Senaratna and others\napologized humbly to the victims, their families, and to the Catholic Church\nand institutes the targeted sites belonged to. Among all the blame lying, I did\nnot hear Ranil Wickremasinghe pointing a finger even once, or blame laying,\ntrying to absolve himself and his party. He got down to business no sooner he\nheard about the first bomb. I heard his interview with the foreign press. He\nheld his own and was a credit to the country..Blame laying was rampant. The\nOpposition Leader emerged loudest. Not only did he say the government had\nfailed to protect the country; he went further by demanding the resignation of\nthe entire Cabinet (UNP). It would have been complete destabilization and more\nroom given anyone and everyone who wanted to kill, maim, rob. Instead of coming\ntogether in a time of dire need, this was his idea \u2013 to grab power, never mind\nwhat happened to dear suffering, highly damaged Sri Lanka, said Cassandra. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We closed our ears when the televised\nParliamentary proceedings had Gunawardena and Weerawansa ranting. In contrast\nwas Field Marshall Fonseka speaking calmly and thus more forcefully. He said a\nperson like himself should be made use of. So true and correct. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wimal\nWeerawansa rode the most favored of his horses of contention, ranting against\nforeign services arriving in Colombo to help in the investigations. He\nmentioned the USA\u2019s FBI and the British Secret Service. How self-serving can\nyou be to target the die-hard nationalist voter by making such pronouncements,\nto say they are infiltrating our land and will cause damage if not take over\nthe country, asked Cassandra.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 They came because the recent bomb blasts that\nshattered the peace and consequent complacency of Sri Lanka is an\ninternationalized matter now. The ISIS is said to be involved, so we need the\nbest expertise from around the world to chase leads and crush the terrorists in\nSri Lanka. The government, not being frog in the well like this politician \u2013\nonly for appearance and to cadge popularity though personally the US seemed to\nbe his family\u2019s frequented holiday resort \u2013 was willing in its dire need to\naccept offered foreign assistance.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The second reason why the government accepted\nforeign help in detection of members of the break-away Muslim group and\ndiffusion of the situation was that foreigners were killed in the hotel blasts\nincluding British and American, so their secret services had every right to be\nhere in Sri Lanka and be involved, concluded Cassandra.  (<\/em>Continued)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

KAMALIKA PIERIS This essay provides additional information on matters which have been discussed in the earlier essays. We start with the investigations into the Easter Sunday bombings ITEM 1  \u2018Praying Mantis\u2019 tells us what the government should have done immediately after the bomb blasts. The government should have immediately imposed an indefinite island-wide curfew, declared […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[104],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-88977","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-kamalika-pieris"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88977","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=88977"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88977\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=88977"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=88977"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=88977"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}