Fresh probe on 2019 Easter Sunday carnage: C4 won’t appear before committee

By Shamindra Ferdinando

The UK’s Channel 4 has declined to appear before the Presidential Commission of Inquiry on the Easter Sunday carnage. The television station has said that it couldn’t reveal confidential sources or what it called confidential journalistic material. Referring to the C4’s response, sources close to the investigation asserted that such a course of action would be severely inimical to those who valued truly independent media.

President Ranil Wickremesinghe has recently appointed retired Supreme Court Justice S.I. Imam to head a Committee to investigate C4 programme “Sri Lanka’s Easter bombings – Dispatches’ that dealt with the Easter Sunday terror attacks. The other two members of the committee are Retired Air Force Commander A.C.M. Jayalath Weerakkody and Harsha A.J. Soza, PC. C4 telecast the programme on 05 September.

Declining to assist in the investigation, C4 has said: “The content of the Programme speaks for itself and Channel 4 has nothing to add beyond the details set out therein.”

On behalf of Justice Imam’s committee, S. Manoharan, Senior Assistant Secretary to the President, has requested C4’s assistance offering an opportunity for a senior representative to appear before the

Committee in person or furnish information through electronic means. Manoharan functions as the Secretary to the Committee.

Among those who appeared on the controversial C4 programme were Hanzeer Azad Maulana, ex-CID officer IP Nishantha Silva, former Human Rights Commissioner Ambika Satkunanathan, former Sunday Leader Editor Fredrika Janz and ex-UNP National List MP Sarath Kongahage.

The main Opposition Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) has demanded that it would join the proposed Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) on the Easter Sunday carnage only if the chairmanship of the PSC was offered to the Opposition. The government is yet to make an announcement in this regard.

The Catholic Church has rejected both the President’s committee as well as the PSC declaring a five-point plan to address its grievances. The Church proposals included temporary suspension of intelligence chiefs and Senior DIGs, Nilantha Jayawardena and Deshabandu Tennakoon, who have been named in the Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI), to facilitate an internationally supervised investigation.