Sri Lanka’s Supreme Court has concluded that the country’s former president Maithripala Sirisena, as well as his security top brass, committed dereliction of duty by failing in their duty to prevent the 2019 Easter attacks, the bloodiest in the country’s recent history, which cost the lives of 279 people.
The attacks consisted of a series of coordinated suicide bombings targeting churches and hotels in the country. More than a hundred people were killed on April 21 in one explosion alone, at St. Sebastian’s Church in the town of Negombo, north of the capital. Another thirty people died in the explosion at the Zion Church in Batticaloa (Eastern province of the country).
A total of 500 people were injured in the explosions, the worst episode of violence in the country since the end of the civil war in 2009. To date, several branches of the investigation suspect that the Islamic State may have been behind the attack, but the Criminal Investigation Department has not found any conclusive evidence of jihadist responsibility.
The former president will have to pay the families of the victims, as compensation, a total of approximately 250,000 euros, according to the Supreme Court ruling, published late Thursday and reported by the Sri Lankan newspaper ‘Daily Mirror’.
Along with the former president, former Inspector General of Police Pujith Jayasundara, former Director of Intelligence Nilantha Jayawardhane, former Defense Minister Hemasiri Fernando and former National Intelligence chief Sisira Mendis have also been sentenced to pay compensation.
Source: (EUROPA PRESS)
