The Police stated that the Senior Deputy Inspector General of Police (SDIG) - Administration and former State Intelligence Service Chief Nilantha Jayawardena had visited Parliament early this week to attend a session of the Sectoral Oversight Committee (SOC) on Energy and Transport, and not to any meeting related to the Easter Sunday terror attacks of 2019.
Claiming that Jayawardena had been invited to make a presentation regarding the terror attacks to Parliamentarians, the Catholic Church expressed its displeasure over the incident, and attributed it to an alleged attempt to hide the truth behind the terror attacks.
Speaking to The Daily Morning yesterday (21), the Police Media Spokesperson, the Senior Superintendent of Police and attorney Nihal Thalduwa said that Jayawardena had not been invited to make any such presentation to the MPs. “On Tuesday (19), he went to Parliament to attend a session of the SOC on Energy and Transport on behalf of the Police Department. The meeting in question had been held on the same day. So, one may have misunderstood that it was to attend the meeting on the terror attacks that Jayawardena had gone there, but it is not what had happened.”
On Tuesday, a special meeting had been held at the Parliamentary committee room number one under the patronage of the Minister of Public Security, Tiran Alles, to inform the MPs of the investigation reports pertaining to the terror attacks. Public Security Ministry Secretary Viyani Gunathilaka, the Inspector General of Police Chandana D. Wickramaratne and senior officials of the Criminal Investigations Department and the Terrorism Investigation Division, and Government and Opposition MPs had attended the meeting.
Speaking to the media on Wednesday (20), Rev. Fr. Cyril Gamini Fernando, representing the Church, claimed that Jayawardena, who had been invited to speak at the relevant meeting, had seen great opposition from Opposition MPs. Recalling the allegations that had been levelled against him (Jayawardena) with regard to the terror attacks, he said that it was ridiculous for such a person to have been invited to make presentations on the related investigations, and attributed the same to an insult to Parliament.