New police unit to deal with abductions

The Government has set up a separate police unit under the charge of a Senior Superintendent of Police and three Assistant Superintendents to deal with all complaints of abductions.

The move is the outcome of a top-level conference this week where leaders of political parties excluding the Tamil National Alliance discussed the rising complaints of reported abductions and kidnappings, particularly in the Colombo and Jaffna districts.

Taking part in the conference were Senior Presidential Advisor Basil Rajapaksa, Defence Secretary Gothabaya Rajapaksa and Police Chief Chandra Fernando among others. Representatives of the United National Party (T. Maheswaran) Western Province People’s Front (Mano Ganeshan) Upcountry People’s Front P. Chandrasekeran and P. Radhakrishnan, Ceylon Workers Congreess M. Sachithanandan and K.Jegathishwaran. The CWC leader Arumugam Thondaman was away in Singapore. The Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna also took part in the meeting.

It was pointed out during the meeting that the LTTE had been raising funds by abducting businessmen and issuing death threats on them. A recent case was one where the Government had restored telephone facilities to Kilinochchi after the recent fighting. One of the calls made by a Tiger guerrilla cadre from Kilinochchi had been to a prominent businessman in Sea Street. It was to ask him to pay millions of rupees or face abduction and death.

It was also observed during the discussion that two kidnappings relating to media personnel could not be fully investigated since the parties involved were not willing to provide details. They were saying they did not want the authorities to proceed with the investigations and would like matters to end there.

Government sources said the new unit will be given full powers, including those under the ongoing state of emergency, to deal firmly with those involved in abductions. It was also pointed out at the conference that some of the abductions were being carried out to bring disrepute to the Government and the security forces.

Meanwhile Tamil parties which were planning to have a hartal in Colombo on Tuesday have decided to postpone it following an assurance from the government that strict action would be taken to prevent abductions.