In the wake of calls from religious and civil society organisations representatives for him to disclose any information he claims to have regarding the masterminds behind the 2019 Easter Sunday terror attacks, Bodu Bala Sena (BBS) General Secretary, Galagodaaththe Gnanasara Thera said that he would reveal such information only if summoned by the relevant authorities.
Representatives of several religious and civil society organisations recently called on him to disclose the information that he claims to have about masterminds behind the terror attacks.
When queried by The Daily Morning as to whether he would disclose the relevant information, Gnanasara Thera said that he would share it only with the relevant authorities, as doing otherwise could create unnecessary problems. “I have information, and I will divulge it only to the relevant authorities. There is no need to discuss this with civil society organisations, as they don’t know these matters in detail. If the relevant authorities summon me, I will provide them with the information that I have.”
Gnanasara Thera, who had been serving a nine-month lenient prison sentence for making defamatory remarks about Islam and was granted bail by the Colombo High Court, recently claimed that he knows the mastermind behind the Easter Sunday terror attacks, and added that he would inform President and Defence Minister Anura Kumara Dissanayake, as well as other relevant officials. He claimed that he knew the mastermind’s identity, background, whereabouts, and how he (mastermind) trained National Thowheed Jama’ath leader Mohamed Cassim Mohamed Zahran, ultimately guiding him towards carrying out the suicide attack.
When The Daily Morning inquired as to whether the Police or the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) would record a statement from Gnanasara Thera, the Minister of Public Security Ananda Wijepala, on an earlier occasion, dismissed the need for serious attention to such statements. “There is no point in discussing the nonsense uttered by various individuals. A proper investigation into the Easter Sunday terror attacks is already being conducted by the CID. If necessary, they will record a statement from him (Gnanasara Thera),” Minister Wijepala added.