The response came following this week’s courtroom shooting that left a known underworld figure dead
The police chief said that there have been 17 shooting incidents and 5 stabbings since January. Pic/PTI
The Sri Lankan government said on Saturday that the recent killings in the country, including that of a prominent underworld figure, appear to be an attempt to undermine the ongoing investigations into high-profile criminal cases such as the 2019 Easter Sunday suicide bombings.
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The government’s response came following this week’s courtroom shooting that left the underworld figure dead. The incident sent shockwaves across the country, leading to the opposition probing the government’s measures to tackle the spate of violence.
“Most of these are done by gangs now resident in neighbouring countries,” Ravi Seneviratne, the secretary to the Ministry of Public Security told reporters. Seneviratne said the government has felt that recent killings were an attempt to sabotage the ongoing investigation into high-profile cases of the past, including the revived investigation on the 2019 Easter Sunday suicide bombings.
Anura Kumara Dissanayake. PIC/X
On April 21, 2019, nine suicide bombers belonging to the local Islamist extremist group National Thawheed Jamaat (NTJ) linked to ISIS carried out a series of blasts that tore through three churches and as many luxury hotels in Sri Lanka, killing 273 people, including 11 Indians.
Sri Lanka’s new President Anura Kumara Dissanayake in September last year said he would reopen an investigation into the terror attacks after meeting with the head of the Catholic Church Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith, who has been critical of the investigation into the attacks.
Blaming both former Presidents Gotabaya Rajapaksa and Ranil Wickremesinghe for the incident, Ranjith slammed the investigation as a political cover-up of the attacks. Police chief Priyantha Weerasuriya on Saturday said there have been 17 shooting incidents and 5 stabbings since January.
The police have identified 57 organised crime gangs operating and manned by around 1,400 gang members. During the press conference, the police chief and enforcement officials faced intense questioning regarding the incident in which two criminal suspects died while in police custody. The police this morning said the two were shot dead by the police when the two criminals tried to grab police weapons in their bid to escape.
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