PSC on Easter Sunday attacks; for whom and for what?
By Gagani Weerakoon - JUN 02 2019President Maithripala Sirisena travelled little over 1300 nautical miles to the Capital of ‘big brother’ India to finally announce a possible date of the next Presidential Election of his own country in which he stands as the only clear candidate in the vicinity - even though he still pretends to shy away from the idea.
President Sirisena who was in India, on Friday, said that the next Presidential election is most likely to be held on 7 December 2019.
Speaking to journalists in New Delhi, shortly after a meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the day after his induction, President Sirisena said that the Elections Commissioner has told him that the Presidential Election should be held by the end of this year.
President Sirisena said that no political party in Sri Lanka had announced their presidential candidate as yet. Therefore, he is not in a hurry to announce his decision.
“I will wait till others announce their presidential candidates to announce my decision,” he said fielding a question.
He also said, although Indian Intelligence agency reports of possible terror attacks had reached officials on 4 April, he was not informed about the impending attacks before he left the country on 16 April.
Addressing Media at the Taj Hotel, he said that had he known about the information, he would not have left the country.
He told Indian Media that a clear report was sent by the Indian intelligence agency about possible attacks. “The info was passed on 4 April. Letters and correspondence took place between the Defence Chiefs and the Secretary to the Ministry of Defence on the issue.”
He said that he was in Sri Lanka for 12 days, but none of the Defence staff informed him of these letters. “Had I known it I wouldn’t have left the island. I would have stayed back and not allowed the attacks to take place. “
He added: “This is why I sacked the Inspector General of Police and the Defence Secretary.”
This is not the first time President Sirisena denied having any information about a possible attack on Easter Sunday.
He, time and time again, not only denied having information to this effect but also sent his Inspector General of Police Pujith Jayasundara on compulsory leave after the latter refused to give in to the demand by the Head of the State to resign. However, then Defence Secretary Hemasiri Fernando, who completely displayed a nonchalant behaviour about the attacks and its gravity and also admitted to have taken the pre-warnings lightly resigned paving way for President Sirisena to appoint a former Army Commander as the Defence Ministry Secretary. IGP Jayasundara has however, filed a Fundamental Rights petition challenging President Sirisena’s decision to send him on compulsory leave and appointing an acting IGP.
President Sirisena on 30 May through his media division issued a statement denying media reports that appeared as the outcome of the Parliamentary Select Committee to probe Easter Sunday attack proceedings.
It said in a statement that there were media reports of a statement made by the Head of the National Intelligence Service, while giving evidence at the Parliamentary Select Committee appointed to look into the 21 April terrorist attacks.
The media reports stated that the National Security Council (NSC) did not meet after February 2019.
As there were media reports appearing unofficially on the proceedings of the NSC, it was decided to establish an NSC with a new format and this has been in operation for more than one year. The new NSC has been meeting every two weeks and, on some occasions, the President has convened the meetings of the NSC every week, it said.
Furthermore, on 8 April 2019, the President has convened the monthly meeting of the Inspector General of Police and Senior Police Officers. This meeting was held for more than two hours and none of the Police Officers informed the President that advance reports on a possible terrorist attack had been received.
Neither the Defence Secretary nor the IGP nor any other officer had informed the President about a warning letter received from a friendly foreign country about the impending 21 April terrorist attacks, the statement said.
This was following National Intelligence Chief Sisira Mendis dropping a bombshell at the first meeting of the PSC when he declared that the IGP Pujith Jayasundara did not respond to any of the communications he sent, since December 2017, on the need to beef-up security measures against possible Islamic State (IS) threats on Sri Lanka.
Mendis, responding to questions by the PSC, appointed to look into and report to Parliament on the terrorist attacks that took place at different places in Sri Lanka on 21 April, also acknowledged that he verbally informed the then Defence Secretary Hemasiri Fernando, about a State Intelligence Service (SIS) report on a possible attack, at around 3 p.m. on 8 April, but until the day the attack took place, none in the defence hierarchy had any dialogue in this connection with him nor had they appeared to have taken things seriously.
Mendis also said that during a weekly Intelligence Coordination Meeting (ICM) in 2017, the SIS raised concerns about information it got that a group of Sri Lankans, who had gone to Syria and joined the IS, was returning to the country. There was a discussion that laws in Sri Lanka were not sufficient to question those alleged IS Members when they returned to Sri Lanka.
Mendis noted that there was a unanimous adoption of Resolution 2253 (2015) under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter to expand and strengthen its Al-Qaida sanctions framework and to include a focus on the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL/Da’esh).
“Pointing out this Resolution, I sent a letter to IGP Jayasundara on 27 November 2017 requesting him to hold discussions with the Attorney General regarding a comprehensive legal mechanism to tackle the IS threat to Sri Lanka. But I did not get a response from his side to the letter. On 1 February 2018, I again sent a letter to him on the same subject. But again I did not receive any response from his end,” Mendis added.
Mendis also said that the NSC discussed about possible IS threats to Sri Lanka several times since 2015 (after his appointment as the National Intelligence Chief on 28 July 2015).
“We saw a threat from the IS and we discussed it. The SIS Director is the one who is given priority during the NSC meetings. He is also given the priority in the ICM as well. He reports directly to the Secretary to the Defence Ministry. The name of Zahran Hashim was first raised in the NSC in March 2017 following a clash between two Muslim groups in Kattankudy. There were discussions that Hashim held extremist ideology. The Terrorism Investigation Division (TID) had done an investigation on him and issued warrants against him,” he said.
Furthermore, the intelligence reports regarding a possible terror attack on Catholic churches, luxury hotels and the Indian High Commission of Sri Lanka were not given priority in the ICM which was held on 9 February 2019, Mendis added.
“SIS Chief, Senior Deputy Inspector General of Police (SDIG) Nilantha Jayawardena sent me a letter with an attachment which contained information of an alleged plan to carry out attacks on Catholic churches, luxury hotels and the Indian High Commission of Sri Lanka on
8 April (later, Mendis corrected this as an imminent plan to carry out attacks). I opened the letter at about 11 a.m. that day. I did not know from where the SIS got that information. Jayawardena’s letter did not mention it. After reading it, I sought an opportunity to speak with the then Defence Secretary Fernando. But he was busy because the Indian Defence Secretary had arrived in Sri Lanka and there was a previously planned meeting between them. I got a chance to speak to Fernando at about 3 p.m. on the same day and I conveyed the information I received verbally.
It seemed to me that he was not aware of the information as such prior to my message.”
“Fernando told me that the matter could be discussed on 9 April during the weekly ICM. State Minister of Defence Ruwan Wijewardena did not participate in that meeting. However, during the meeting, that information on a terror attack was not given priority. I was keeping the letter I received from the SIS Chief on my table. I was seated between the IGP and the SIS Chief. When the meeting was going to end, I told them that we should discuss about the terror attack plan,” he added.
Mendis further said that on the same day (9 April) he sent a letter regarding the terror attack plan to the IGP. “I mentioned at the top of the letter that the information contained in it should be given top priority. But the IGP did not respond to that. Until 21 April, no one talked with me regarding the importance of that information,” he noted.
The National Intelligence Chief made another shocking revelation during the PSC hearing. He said that after 19 February 2019, the NSC had not met until 22 April, a day after the deadly terror attacks.
“Before 19 February, the NSC met on 14 January 2019. The meetings days in 2018 are 5 January, 19 February, 5 March, 2 May, 10 July, 23 October, 13 November and 3 December. During some of these meetings, SIS Chief Jayawardena spoke about Hashim and his allies spreading hate speech and extremism. The IGP did not attend the NSC meetings after November 2018. Normally, it is the Defence Secretary’s office which sends messages to the participants of the NSC regarding the date and time of the meetings. I remember that since November 2018, those messages did not say that we were summoned for the NSC meetings. Instead, the messages stated that they are special meetings.”
“When colossal amounts of explosives were found in Wanathawilluwa in January 2019, the NSC discussed about it. At that moment, the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) was carrying out investigations regarding that. It was discussed that the CID should continue its investigations further.”
Secretary of the Defence Ministry, Retired General Shantha Kottegoda, who was appointed to the post after Fernando stepped down, giving a statement to the PSC said that it seems to him that no proper mechanism had been formulated to address the terror attack even though information regarding such an act was there since 2014. He also said that there had been flaws in analysing the intelligence information.
He said that the immediate terror threat has been decreased by 99 per cent as of now.
“I mentioned it as a short term plan. To prevent these types of terror attacks, we must have long term plans as well. This is not something like the war we fought with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. We cannot tackle the current terror threats in two to three months,” he pointed out.
He said that he will present lists of participants who attended the NSC meetings in 2018 at a future date as per the request of the PSC.
He said that after his appointment, there had been at least one NSC weekly meeting being held following the current security situation. Sometimes the NSC meets two to three days per week, he added.
Kottegoda also said that he personally believes that certain statements made by Bodu Bala Sena (BBS) General Secretary Ven. Galagodaaththe Gnanasara Thera after being released from prison should not have been made.
The Defence Secretary made this remark when PSC Member and Parliamentarian, Field Marshal Sarath Fonseka showed a report published in a national newspaper to him. The news headline showed Gnanasara saying, “We will create a new force to crackdown on extremism.”
“There were intelligence reports about possible unrest in Kurunegala on 28 April following an organised gathering in the town. We saw that outsiders and several powerful figures including a Buddhist monk were wandering in the area. As we took necessary steps, we were able to control the situation without any damage. These things are like poking in one’s eyes. Because of these things, we have to use our strength to control the communal tensions instead of focusing on counter terrorism operations,” he elaborated.
The inaugural meeting of the PSC was chaired by President’s Counsel and MP Dr. Jayampathy Wickramaratne as its Chairman, Deputy Speaker Ananda Kumarasiri was overseas. Apart from Kumarasiri, Minister Dr. Rajitha Senaratne and MP M.A. Sumanthiran PC were also overseas.
MPs Dr. Nalinda Jayatissa and Professor Ashu Marasinghe, Minister Ravi Karunanayake, Field Marshal Fonseka and Minister Rauff Hakeem participated in the meeting.
This is the first time in Sri Lankan Parliament’s history in which the Media was allowed to cover a PSC meeting.
The next PSC meeting will be held on 4 June from 3 p.m. However, now there is a debate whether the proceedings of the PSC should be made open to the public through Media or not.
UPFA General Secretary Mahinda Amarawera and SLFP National Organiser Duminda Dissanayake slammed the Government for live telecasting the sittings of PSC. They said that it was putting the lives of Intelligence officers in peril and in addition jeopardising national security.
Amaraweera told a Media briefing at SLFP headquarters that this will not only disclose information to Sri Lankans but all other countries, adding that no other country has done such a thing to make the Intelligence Service vulnerable.
“Everyone knows that any fact or information on the national security of a country will not be inked in any paper or will not be talked about in public. That is how national security information should be protected. But by doing this, even the lives of Intelligence officials are imperilled,” he added.
Amaraweera stressed that if any danger befalls these officials, those who represent the PSC should take responsibility. He said officials of the Intelligence Service have the right to be without giving information when asked, but acknowledged that it was not ethically practical.
On behalf of the UPFA, Amaraweera and Dissanayake urged Speaker Karu Jayasuriya to look into the matter and take action to stop live telecasting of PSC proceedings.
Interestingly, Leader of the House and Minister Lakshman Kiriella stated all areas that came under attack, such as Beruwala, Digana, the Eastern areas, Kochchikade, Negombo and Kurunegala, are considered UNP strongholds and “therefore there is something behind these attacks, which we have to reflect as to who is really trying to gain advantages by attacking UNP strongholds.”
He stated: “I must say that a Select Committee was appointed to look into the unfortunate event that took place on 21 April, on a proposal I had made. I emphasise that everybody has a right to know about that unfortunate event. Accordingly, the Speaker decided to broadcast the Committee proceedings live. However, a person disrupted this revelation of truth to the people by pulling the plug during the live broadcast that day.
That was a violation of Parliamentary privileges. Nobody has a right to disrupt a decision taken by the Parliament as per the provisions of the Constitution. What are they trying to conceal? People in this country have a right to know what really happened on 21 April and where the system was not in line.”
