The Catholic Church stated that it is not ready to discuss the related investigations with any party representing the Government until the recommendations made by the Presidential Commission of Inquiry (CoI), which investigated the Easter Sunday terror attacks of 21 April 2019, are implemented.
Public Security Minister Tiran Alles on Monday (28) raised concerns about the extent of the desire of the Catholic community, including the Church, to uncover the truth behind the terror attacks, claiming that they had not responded favourably to his invitation for them (the Church) to get together with the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) and analyse the progress of investigations.
Speaking to The Daily Morning yesterday (29), Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Sri Lanka (CBCSL) National Director of Communications Father Jude Chrishantha Fernando charged that Alles is merely making statements to the media, but not doing what needs to be done. “We saw him saying that certain parties are only holding media briefings about this, and not interested in uncovering the truth, but what we see is that he is doing the same thing. The CoI has recommended that criminal charges be filed against several individuals, including former President and incumbent Opposition Parliamentarian Maithripala Sirisena and the former State Intelligence Service Director and incumbent Senior Deputy Inspector General of Police Nilantha Jayawardena. The Government has not implemented any of those recommendations. What Alles should first do is to consult the relevant parties and make necessary interventions to implement them.”
In response to the Minister’s remarks on the fact that the Church had not responded to his invitation even after he took steps to hand over the complete CoI report to them, Fernando said that they are thankful to Alles for having done so, but that there is no point in receiving the report if what it recommends is not implemented.
“We thank him for handing it over to us, but what is the use of receiving a report if its content is limited to words? By boasting about his action to hand it over to us, he accepts that the CoI report is something that is important. So, he should first do what it has recommended, and then seek to meet us. We must tell him that the Church is not something that consists of brainless people. We are keeping an eye on everything that happens,” Fernando said.
The final report of the CoI was tabled in Parliament on 8 April 2021, but the witness records were not released reportedly due to legal reasons. In February 2022, all the volumes of the report, including the related witness records, were handed over to the Speaker of Parliament Mahinda Yapa Abeywardana. However, several parties, including the Church, had been accusing the Government of not releasing certain sections of the report in an alleged attempt to cover up the truth behind the terror attacks. Against that backdrop, Alles had handed over the complete report to the CBCSL in April this year.
In response to a media query on Monday, Alles said that he was of the view that 99% of the related investigations carried out by the CID are over. “The Catholic Church and certain other individuals keep holding media briefings, claiming that investigations have not been conducted properly. They were lamenting that they had not been given the CoI’s report, and then I took steps to hand it over to them. Both before and after that, I urged the Church to grant us an opportunity to meet them and explain the current status of the investigations, but there has been no response to date,” he said.