BY Buddhika Samaraweera

The Catholic Church has urged the authorities to conduct an inquiry into the incident where certain top brass of the Police had visited Mahanayaka (Chief Prelate) of the Asgiri Chapter of the Siam Sect Ven. Warakagoda Dhammasiddhi Gnanarathana Thera to highlight that some injustice has allegedly been caused to certain police officials through the final report of the Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI) into the Easter Sunday terror attacks of 21 April 2019.

 

Speaking to The Morning, National Catholic Social Communication Centre Director and Kurana St. Anne’s Church Parish Priest Rev. and Fr. Cyril Gamini Fernando claimed that it is not acceptable for police officials, who are tasked with ensuring law and order in the country, to go in uniform and inform religious leaders about the allegations levelled against them and to make media statements.

“If an allegation is made against someone, they should face legal action and then they can prove it before the law if they are right. In such a situation, it is not at all acceptable for police officials to go to religious leaders and try to thereby evade the allegations levelled against them,” he claimed.

Fernando also claimed that certain police officers had said that the Sinhalese people are going to be punished for the Easter Sunday terror attacks and that this is a very serious statement. He added that instead of properly conducting investigations into the terror attacks, thereby serving justice to the victims, certain individuals are attempting to create an ethnic conflict by making such statements.

On 19 August 2021, top brass of the Police including Senior Deputy Inspector General of Police (SDIG) Deshabandu Tennakoon and SDIG Nandana Munasinghe met with Ven. Gnanarathana Thera where they have pointed out that some injustice has been caused to certain police officials through the investigations into the terror attacks, particularly through the final report of the PCoI.

Speaking to the media present, SDIG Tennakoon said that neither the then Government nor the Defence Ministry had given any clear instructions to the Police with regard to the intelligence material they had received.

“Police officials are not connected to the terror attacks and they are being held accountable simply because they were on duty. When such investigations are taking place, it affects the retirement and pension of the police officials,” he added.