Dappula’s Easter Sunday ‘grand conspiracy’ claim demolished

Senior Additional Solicitor General Haripriya Jayasundera, PC, requested the Trial-at-Bar ahead of the declaration of its verdict that those found guilty should be dealt with in a manner that would serve as a deterrent to anyone of any religious and social environment who holds extremist views. Declaring that none of the accused had shown regret, Haripriya alleged that they were still holding on to their ideology. She painted an extremely dangerous picture of the religious mindset of a group of people who still remained a threat to society.

Mohammadu Ibrahim Mohamad Naufer, aka Naufer Maulavi, 48, sentenced to 220 years of rigorous imprisonment by the High Court trial-at-Bar on 22 Sept. for his role in the 2019 Easter Sunday carnage, was taken into custody a few days after the incident. It was considered the principal case as there are other cases concluded and in progress.

At the time the police apprehended him, following a tip off received from the staff of a small hotel in Dambulla, where he was taking refuge, the Sainthamaruthu suicide blasts had taken place. Fifteen persons died in the suicide blasts, triggered by some of them, on 26 April 2019, after police, backed by the Army, surrounded their hideout.

Naufer Maulavi was initially cleared but an immediate subsequent check led to his arrest in the first week of May 2019. He was taken in at Dambulla, following consultations between Dambulla police and the Terrorist Investigation Division (TID). At the time of the multiple Easter Sunday blasts, Naufer Maulavi had been in Colombo and was on his way to the densely populated and predominantly Muslim Kattankudy, his home town on the eastern coast.

Naufer Maulavi was among 15 persons charged with plotting the Easter Sunday bomb attacks that killed 270 people and injured more than 500. The prosecution named him the mastermind in the unprecedented terrorist operation carried out by the now proscribed National Thowheeth Jamaath (NTJ). Nine other men were acquitted. Of the 25 accused, the 17th died in custody.

It would be pertinent to mention that the US Justice Department identified Naufer Maulavi, brother-in-law of Zahran Hashim, as one of the three persons, with Muhammed Riskan and Ahamed Milhan being the others, as conspirators in the ISIS plot. Let me stress that Naufer Maulawi and Zahran Hashim had been at the helm of the NTJ responsible for the carnage.

The US, too, identified Naufer Maulavi as the Easter Sunday architect, though some still considered Zahran Hashim as the mastermind. Colombo Trial-at-Bar found Naufer Maulavi, Muhammed Riskan and Ahamed Milhan guilty. The 15 accused were sentenced to 200 to 260 years in prison.

Now that Naufer Maulavi had been sentenced to life imprisonment for masterminding the Easter Sunday carnage, perhaps a controversial declaration made by Dappula de Livera, PC, on the eve of his retirement as the Attorney General, should be re-examined. Outspoken Livera alleged a grand conspiracy with regard to the 2019 April attacks but resorted to legal recourse to thwart the TID from questioning him. The Court of Appeal issued an interim order blocking his arrest or questioning him regarding the controversial statement. The Attorney General couldn’t have been referring to Naufer Maulavi.

Livera received appointment as Acting AG on 29 April, 2019, in the wake of the Sainthamaruthu blasts, and received confirmation on 10 May 2019, following approval by the Constitutional Council. He relinquished Office on 25 May, amidst the raging controversy over his grand conspiracy claims.

Dr. Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe, PC, in his capacity as the Justice Minister of the post-Aragalaya Wickremesinghe-Rajapaksa government, directed the TID to question Livera, in April 2023. Unfortunately, it was not to be. Sanjay Rajaratnam, PC, replaced Livera in May 2021. In July 2024, Parinda Ranasinghe (Jnr), PC, succeeded Rajaratnam.

The issue at hand is why Livera failed to file indictments or directed comprehensive police investigations while during his tenure as the AG. The undeniable truth is successive governments failed to pursue Livera’s claim that paved the way for unsubstantiated accusations pertaining to a wider conspiracy. Unfortunately, Livera’s claim remains uninvestigated to date.

None of those demanding justice for the Easter Sunday victims ever requested Livera to assist the investigation.

We refrain from speculating as to why Livera sought an extension, though President Rajapaksa offered him the golden opportunity to serve as our High Commissioner in Ottawa in his retirement. In fact, his then Coordinating Officer, State Counsel Nishara Jayaratne, offered the writer an opportunity to interview the outgoing AG and received a set of questions for him to respond, but at the eleventh hour, he cancelled it. With Livera’s retirement, Ms. Jayaratne, relinquished her position created especially for her. That position was abolished.

But, his explosive claim, as the outgoing AG, fuelled conspiracy theory that 2019 SLPP presidential election candidate Gotabaya Rajapaksa, through former head of Directorate of Military Intelligence (DMI), the then Brigadier Suresh Sallay, arranged the attacks to facilitate his victory.

Forty-five foreigners were among those who perished in the Easter Sunday massacre. Altogether, 279 persons, including suicide bombers, perished on that day. The dead included Fatima Ibrahim, the pregnant wife of suicide bomber Ilham Ibrahim, the Shangri-la bomber, and sister-in-la of Inshaf Ibrahim, who blasted himself at the Cinnamon Grand. Fatima blasted herself during a police raid on their Dematagoda mansion where law enforcement authorities apprehended her father-in-law, wealthy spice trader Mohamed Yusuf Ibrahim. The blast triggered by Fatima also claimed the lives of her two children and three policemen assigned to the search party.

The prominent spice tycoon was granted bail on 25 May 2022, during Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s presidency.

Ibrahim, who had been on the JVP’s National List at the 2015 parliamentary election, was not among those charged before the Trial-at-Bar. Was it a case of no limit to what money or influence can secure?

Another person, who had been arrested under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA), in April 2020, but granted bail by the Court of Appeal, on 7 February 2022, is Hejaaz Hisbullah, who served as the lawyer for the Ibrahims. Hisbullah received bail several weeks before Mohamed Yusuf Ibrahim did.

In spite of being arrested over his alleged links to the Easter Sunday massacre, the lawyer was formally charged with the lesser offence of inciting communal disharmony/racial hatred, based on a speech allegedly given at an Islamic school. His arrest received international attention with even the Geneva-based United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) taking it up. Amnesty International named the lawyer a prisoner of conscience. International organisations issued a spate of statements expressing serious concern over the lawyer’s arrest though no one challenged him for serving the Ibrahim family.

The investigation also targeted Colossus (Pvt.) Ltd, a copper factory located in Wellampitiya, managed by the Cinnamon Grand bomber. During the investigations, it transpired that the factory, obviously through connections, secured large stocks of non-ferrous metals and, in once instance, ex-lawmaker Shantha Bandara, who had been serving as the Director General of Public Relations at President Maithripala Sirisena’s Office, directed Industrial Development Board (IDB) to allocate 500 tonnes of brass/copper scrap to Colossus (Pvt.) Ltd. The IDB hadn’t been able to fulfill Bandara’s directive because it didn’t have such a large quantity at the time the request was made. Investigations revealed that the Wellampitiya factory, situated just five kms away from the Dematagoda mansion, was used to prepare explosives used in suicide jackets. Many an eyebrow was raised when a group of workers, arrested on 22 April, 2019, in connection with the investigation, was granted bail on 6 May, 2019. Although police headquarters announced an internal investigation, the country was never told what really happened in court on 6 May. The investigation, undertaken by the Special Investigation Unit (SIU), as far as this writer is aware of, was never made public.

The statements at that time made by AG Livera, and also attributed to him, made interesting reading. Livera made some thought-provoking statements regarding the Easter Sunday investigations but caused irrevocable damage before he retired.

Years later, former parliamentarian Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe disclosed, at a public meeting in Kandy, why Livera caused the Easter Sunday controversy. The former Minister alleged that the AG claimed what the media called a grand conspiracy after President Gotabaya Rajapakshe turned down his request for a one-year extension. The former AG never contested this claim.

By the time Livera retired, the investigation conducted by the CID had reached a crucial stage. In the second week of August, 2021, AG Rajaratnam forwarded indictments to the Chief Justice in respect of 25 suspects over conspiracy to stage the 2019 Easter Sunday terror attacks.

A total of 23,270 charges were filed, including conspiracy to murder, aiding and abetting, collecting arms and ammunition, and attempted murder under the PTA. Trials before the three-judge bench, consisting of Judges Navaratne Marasinghe, Ramanathan Kannan, and Sujeewa Nissanka, on November 22, 2021, and concluded evidence recordings on August 24, 2026.

During the high profile battle over the 22nd Amendment to the Constitution, President Anura Kumara Dissanayake attributed the delay in filling vacancies in the Court of Appeal due to the Easter Sunday Trial-at-Bar. Immediately after the declaration of the Easter Sunday verdict, Navaratne Marasinghe was referred to the Constitutional Council by President Dissanayake.

The Easter Sunday probe began under the Sirisena-Wickremesinghe government. Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s administration took over the investigation in Nov. 2019, followed by the Wickremesinghe-Rajapaksa government in July 2022, and then by Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s government in Sept. 2024.

Having backed Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s candidature at the 2019 Nov. presidential election, the Catholic Church first sought an explanation from the President, in mid July 2021, regarding his failure to act on the PCoI recommendations. The Church released to the media its letter signed by the Archbishop of Colombo Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith and several auxiliary bishops. Altogether there were close to 30 signatories. The Church resorted to a warning letter in the wake of the slow progress in the overall process, in spite of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa receiving the PCoI recommendations on 1 Feb. 2021. Livera served as the AG.

The JVP/NPP, under any circumstances, cannot deny that Minister Dr. Nalinda Jayatissa, who served the Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) that probed Easter Sunday carnage in Feb. 2021, alleged direct Indian involvement in the reprehensible act. Dr. Jayatissa explained to the BBC Sinhala Service why he reached that conclusion and a few years later former President Maithripala Sisisena, too, directed accusations against India.

SSP Shanie Abeysekera, who had been the Director, CID, at the time of the attacks, and was removed from that post, less than a week after Gotabaya Rajapaksa took Office as the President. Having campaigned for the JVP/NPP, Abeysekera who had been in retirement was reinstated to the Police Department in Oct. 2024 and named Director CID in June 2025. Ravi Seneviratne, who had been Abeysekera’s superior at the time of the Easter Sunday carnage, returned as Secretary to the Public Security Ministry.

The unexplainable failure on the part of the Gotabaya Rajapaksa administration to implement the PCoI recommendations was cleverly utilised by the NPP/JVP in line with its overall strategy that made the Catholic Church throw its weight behind the political movement to oust President Rajapaksa. Perhaps, the country at large still does not know that the Catholic Church, in its July 2021 letter to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, specifically questioned the inordinate delay in taking punitive action against former President Sirisena.

Unfortunately, by then Sirisena had become a member of the SLPP parliamentary group and functioned as the leader of the SLFP, the second largest party in the ruling coalition. The SLPP parliamentary group consisted of 14 SLFPers in a 145-member government parliamentary group. Against that backdrop, the President had no option but to conveniently ignore the PCoI recommendations. By the time the President received the PCoI recommendations, the SLFP had consolidated its hold, via its unconditional support to enact the controversial 20th Amendment to the Constitution.

The SLPP enacted the 20th Amendment to the Constitution in late Oct. 2020, several weeks after the parliamentary polls. That enabled the President to bring a dual US, Sri Lankan citizen to Parliament and accommodate him in the Cabinet in early July 2021 after the economic crisis gripped the country. The SLPP didn’t know where it was heading.

The President’s decision to accommodate Suresh Sallay, who held the rank of Brigadier as the Director of State Intelligence Service (SIS), a position that had never been bestowed on an armed forces officer, obviously gave an opportunity for the interested parties to exploit the situation. Sallay received the appointment as Director SIS on 8 Dec. 2019 and was elevated to the rank of Maj. Gen. on 22 May 2020.

The Easter Sunday attacks dominated the 2019, 2020 and 2024 national election platforms. The Easter Sunday fallout, without doubt, facilitated the overall SLPP strategy at the 2019 and 2020 presidential and parliamentary polls, respectively. There cannot be any dispute over that. The Catholic Church adopted a transparently hostile position vis a vis the UNP, following Sajith Premadasa’s heavy defeat at the presidential poll, and many of those who backed him felt the Archbishop of Colombo Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith ensured Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s triumph. But, former Yahapalana Minister Harin Fernando, whose bombshell revelation that his ailing father, receiving treatment at a private hospital, knew of the impending attacks, went public with the allegation. The outspoken politician alleged that the Archbishop’s partisan actions cost the SJB five percent of the Catholic vote and the election.

The Archdiocese of Colombo said that Fernando’s comments were unfounded and uncalled for and were made for cheap political gain. Now, the allegations have turned a full circle and the Church is being accused of targeting Gotabaya Rajapaksa.

At the 2024 national elections, the JVP/NPP exploited the Easter Sunday fallout to its full advantage. That exploitation should be examined taking into consideration the Catholic Church throwing its weight behind a US-India backed political operation that forced the President out of Office in July.

In spite of several high profile investigations, certain developments didn’t receive the attention they deserved. Efforts made by the NTJ to form an alliance to represent its interests in Parliament should have been thoroughly investigated. The NTJ sought to form that alliance on the lines of LTTE-TNA (Tamil National Alliance) partnership. Established in 2001, the LTTE-TNA alliance functioned until the very end of the LTTE’s collapse on the Vanni east front. At one-time, the TNA group, consisting of 22 lawmakers represented in Parliament (2004 to 2010). But, the NTJ couldn’t implement a successful strategy. Perhaps, its failure to establish an effective proxy at the 2015 parliamentary polls and the massive political turmoil caused by the Sirisena-Mahinda Rajapaksa alliance, formed in late Oct. 2018. at the expense of the UNP, may have influenced the Easter Sunday attacks. Or the NTJ may have advanced its plans in a bid to take advantage of the crisis situation.

The first indication of a small section of the Muslim community establishing contact with ISIS was disclosed in Nov 2016 by the then Justice Minister Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe. Instead of taking action, Wickremesinghe let loose his parliamentary group on Rajapakshe. Some MPs tore into Rajapakshe who caused himself further trouble when he openly criticised the leasing of strategic Hambantota port on a 99-year-lease to China.

During a hastily called media briefing at Sri Lanka Foundation, Rajapakshe warned that the US wouldn’t leave Sri Lanka alone as long the Hambantota port remained in the Chinese hands. That stunning declaration was made amidst tumult over the Easter Sunday attacks.

What really prompted the NTJ to seek political alliance with Muslim political groups aligned with the UNP. The writer had an opportunity to examine the NTJ’s relationship with the National Front for Good Governance (NFGG) when the political grouping called a media briefing at Mandarina Hotel, Galle Road, in late May 2019. NFGG leader Abdul Rahuman explained their dealings with Zahran Hashim in the run up to the 2015 parliamentary elections. Responding to The Island queries, Rahuman said that though NFGG received recognition only in 2017, he was able to contest the 2015 parliamentary election on the SLMC ticket.

According to Rahuman, he got the opportunity to contest the 2015 parliamentary polls thanks to a tripartite agreement among the UNP, SLMC and his NFGG involved with the NTJ in 2015 and 2016. However, the NFGG ended its contacts with the NTJ after the latter went underground in March 2017. But, by 2017, law enforcement authorities knew what NTJ was up to. In spite of the TID seeking instructions from the AG, that Department failed to respond for over a year. The PCoI, too, mentioned the AG’s department’s lapse in its recommendations.

The briefing provided by Brig. Chula Kodituwakku, the then head of the DMI, at the Janadhipathi Mandiraya, in the presence of President Sirisena and Army Commander Lt. Gen. Mahesh Senanayake, proved that the DMI knew the clandestine activities of the NTJ and Jamathei Millathu Ibrahim (JMI). The writer was among those present there.

Although various interested parties, including the Catholic Church, claimed that Sallay, arrested in February this year and named a suspect in another Easter Sunday case, had been the head of DMI at the time of the attacks, it was not so. Yahapalana Premier Wickremesinghe unceremoniously sacked Sallay and packed him off to our diplomatic mission in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The investigation into Sallay’s alleged role had been initiated in response to Krishnan Guru-Murthy’s Channel 4 documentary aired in early Sept. 2023, a year ahead of the last presidential election. The documentary on Easter Sunday bombings became a major issue on JVP/NPP’s presidential and parliamentary polls platforms. The rest is history.