A judgement which shook the masterminds to purge

The complete historic decision of the Supreme Court, which shook the masterminds and made Sirisena and his allies to purge...! What should righteous national and international forces do now?

On the date of this writing, the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka gave a historic decision regarding the Easter massacre which is approaching its four years, on 12 January 2023.

The decision gave a new life and a new inspiration to the people who have been engaged in a continuous struggle for justice to the 2019 Easter Sunday massacre.

12 fundamental rights petitions filed by the innocent civilians injured in the attack, including members of the victims’ families, were heard continuously for three years. A seven-member Supreme Court bench led by Chief Justice Jayantha Jayasuriya heard the case and gave this historic decision.

Having concluded that the fundamental rights of the petitioners have been seriously violated by ignoring the prior intelligence received about the attack, the said honourable judges immediately ordered the below named criminal assistant respondents to pay a huge compensation from their personal money.

Naming Sirisena and his outfit as definite criminals involved in the Easter crime and ordering to pay a huge compensation to the victims has given a new life to the true fighters who love justice.

Accordingly, Maithripala Sirisena was ordered to pay Rs. 100 million as compensation, former State Intelligence Chief Nilantha Jayawardena, who is the second in command of the police has to pay Rs. 75 million compensation and an immediate disciplinary inquiry was ordered against him. Further former Inspector General of Police Pujitha Jayasundara was ordered to pay Rs. 75 million and former Secretary of the Ministry of Defence Hemasiri Fernando to pay Rs. 50 million and the Supreme Court ordered former National Intelligence Chief Sisira Mendis to pay Rs. 10 million as compensation.

Kekille’s previous decision

At this moment of justice, one cannot forget the King Kekille verdict given during the reign of the ousted President Gotabaya, to the same Easter attack.

In other words, 850 indictments were filed against Hemasiri and Pujitha but due to the orders and intervention of Gotabaya, the Attorney General’s Department withdrew the charges against Hemasiri and Pujitha and both were acquitted by a bizarre decision of the Colombo High Court.

What should be done now?

This is a victory for justice. But justice would be complete only by finding the masterminds of this collaborative crime and taking legal action against them to prevent such atrocious political killing which would ever happen once again in Sri Lanka.

Therefore, we should immediately take the support of the Scotland Yard investigators from Britain, conduct an independent and impartial investigation into the attack and the background which led to the attack, file evidence against the relevant persons and lobby nationally and internationally to achieve justice through a criminal court process.

Based on the decision of this case, President Ranil Wickremesinghe should be forced to enforce justice. It is clear that he is totally in the habit of protecting the cowardly vile criminals. But all those who have fought to bring justice to this crime must unite to exert pressure on him to bring justice. Pressure should be exerted so that international investigations receive the full support of the Sri Lankan Police and the criminal investigation in such a way that the department acts independently.

The attack was carried out by Zaharan to bring a vile murderer into power. The world can know without doubt that this attack was actually done by Zaharan to bring a vile murderer into power, the vile murderer who has been in Sri Lanka so far.

The Catholic churches, mass organisations, national and international justice-seeking forces must come together. His eminence the Cardinal and all Catholic leaders of Sri Lanka should take the lead in this matter honestly, directly, impartially without double games.

Such a sacrifice is justice for all the 269 loss of lives including children, adults, pregnant women, elderly, domestic and foreign unarmed people who died in the Easter massacre. Also, it is a noble sacrifice to prevent such an extremist mass murder attack that would happen once again in the future for the sake of a political power transfer.

We will continue to follow this until it is fulfilled!

Azgar Nuhman