Easter Sunday carnage: Was there a foreign hand?

Wednesday 17th March, 2021

Anyone who has perused the final report of the Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI) on the Easter Sunday terror attacks will agree with Archbishop of Colombo His Eminence Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith that the document is incomplete. The Commission’s hard work should not go unappreciated, as the prelate has rightly pointed out, but it needs to be added that the report hardly provides fresh insights or any individuated reading that can help clear doubts in one’s mind about the real masterminds of the terror strikes.

The PCoI seems to have belaboured the obvious although it was expected to dig deep enough to expose the masterminds of the carnage. It was public knowledge that the National Thowheed Jamaath (NTJ) led by Zahran Hashim carried out the attacks; the yahapalana government (including President Maithripala Sirisena, Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe), defence bigwigs, the police in general and the IGP in particular, the intelligence chiefs and others failed to prevent the attacks despite repeated early warnings. What had to be found out was whether the NTJ had foreign handlers.

The PCoI seems to have dealt with the alleged foreign involvement in the Easter Sunday carnage rather perfunctorily. It has devoted only an eight-page chapter in its bulky report to the claim of a foreign hand in the attacks. This section, in our book, lacks clarity and proper analysis. The witnesses who expressly testified that there was ‘an external hand or conspiracy behind the attacks’, according to the PCoI, are Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith, former President Sirisena, former Minister Rauf Hakeem, former Minister Rishad Bathiudeen, former Governor Azath Salley, SJB MP Mujibur Rahman, former SIS Director SDIG Nilantha Jayawardena, former STF Commandant M. R. Lateef, former Chief of Defence Staff Ravindra Wijegunaratne, former SDIG CID Ravi Seneviratne and former CID Director Shani Abeysekera. Dismissing their statements as mere ipse dixits (assertions made but not proven), the PCoI report says on page 472, that it did not find any such foreign link. It has, however, recommended that certain identified parties be further investigated.

Factors such as the indoctrination of children, stockpiling of arms and explosives, and the establishment of a terror network complete with training centres suggest that the NTJ and/or its handlers had a long-term strategy. The PCoI would have us believe that it was the circumstances that made Zahran advance his terror attacks. The Commission report says (page 467): “The original plan of Zahran was to attack the Kandy Perahera. But it was advanced due to the recovery of explosives from Wanathawilluwa and international factors. IS was losing ground in Syria and Iraq and called on its faithful to launch attacks. He was also concerned that the law enforcement authorities may apprehend him soon.” But would Zahran have made such elaborate preparations for a one-off attack on the Kandy Perahera or any other target?

The mention of the military setbacks of the IS overseas as a reason for Zahran’s decision to advance his attacks is of interest. Was it from the real IS that he received orders? This question has gone unanswered. We argued, in this column, prior to the release of the PCoI report that it was possible that Zahran and his gang had taken orders from a fake IS created by a foreign spy agency. Senior DIG Jayawardena, who was the Director of SIS at the time of the attacks, told the Commission that there could have been a foreign involvement. The PCoI report (page 218) quotes Jayawardena as having said that an Indian named Abu Hind ‘may have triggered the attacks’; it says, “He [Jayawardena] went on to imply that the intelligence agencies that provided him with the intelligence on 4th, 20th and 21st April 2019 may have had a hand in the attack.” According to the report an ‘international expert on terrorism, who testified in camera, said, “Abu Hind was a character created by a section of a provincial Indian intelligence apparatus, and the intelligence that the Director SIS received on the 4th, 20th and 21st April 2019 was from this operation and the intelligence operative pretending to be one Abu Hind. Operatives of this outfit operate in social media pretending to be Islamic State figures. They are trained to run virtual persona.” (Emphasis added.) The report goes on to say, “The testimony was that Zahran believed Abu Hind was the Islamic State regional representative. Abu Hind was in touch with both Zahran and his brother, Rilwan, and had spoken to Naufer. This part of the evidence is confirmed by the testimony of Hadiya.” It is mentioned on page 220 of the report that according to the aforesaid international expert ‘the Indian Central Government was not aware of the intelligence obtained by the provincial outfit’. Curiouser and curiouser!

If it is true that the NTJ had foreign handlers, then the threat of terror will persist until they are traced and dealt with. There is a pressing need for a separate probe to find out whether an external force was behind the Easter Sunday carnage. Now that the PCoI has said that the aforesaid witnesses did not furnish credible evidence to support their claims that there was a foreign involvement, it is incumbent upon them to provide more information.