{"id":93214,"date":"2019-09-22T19:30:23","date_gmt":"2019-09-23T01:30:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=93214"},"modified":"2019-09-22T12:06:56","modified_gmt":"2019-09-22T19:06:56","slug":"sri-lanka-president-forms-five-member-committee-to-probe-easter-sunday-bombings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2019\/09\/22\/sri-lanka-president-forms-five-member-committee-to-probe-easter-sunday-bombings\/","title":{"rendered":"Sri Lanka President forms five-member committee to probe Easter Sunday bombings"},"content":{"rendered":"

Courtesy The Hindu<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n
\"Keeping<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Keeping vigil: A soldier stands guard in front of St. Anthony\u2019s Shrine in Colombo on Friday, following a series of bomb blasts targeting churches and luxury hotels on Easter Sunday.  MORE-INSri Lanka Easter bombings<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The committee would comprise two appeal court judges, two retired high court judges and a retired administrator<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena has appointed a five-member committee to investigate allegations of intelligence inputs being ignored and related errors that led to the Easter Sunday bombings, killing over 258 people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to an extraordinary gazette notification on Saturday, the committee would comprise two appeal court judges, two retired high court judges and a retired administrator.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The panel will investigate allegations of disregarding of prior intelligence inputs on the Easter attacks and related errors which stopped authorities from taking preventive action.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On April 21, nine suicide bombers carried out a series of blasts that tore through three churches and as many high-end hotels in Sri Lanka\u2019s capital Colombo, killing 258 people.ALSO READEaster bombings: new evidence points to lapses<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Islamic State claimed the attacks, but the government has blamed local Islamist extremist group National Thawheed Jamaath (NTJ) for the bombings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The new five-member committee was constituted following local Catholic church Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith\u2019s demand for an independent investigation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Earlier, Mr. Sirisena had appointed a three-member panel to probe the attacks that led to the sacking and the arrest of the then police chief Pujith Jayasundera<\/a><\/strong>and top defense ministry official Hemasiri Fernando.<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mr. Sirisena initially resisted a parliamentary probe and slammed its suggestion as an attempt to pin the blame on him for the attacks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The constitution of the latest panel is being seen as a move to appease the Catholic minorities ahead of the November 16 presidential election.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is not yet clear if Mr. Sirisena will contest the elections.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Courtesy The Hindu Keeping vigil: A soldier stands guard in front of St. Anthony\u2019s Shrine in Colombo on Friday, following a series of bomb blasts targeting churches and luxury hotels on Easter Sunday.  MORE-INSri Lanka Easter bombings The committee would comprise two appeal court judges, two retired high court judges and a retired administrator Sri […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-93214","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93214","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=93214"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93214\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=93214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=93214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=93214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}