An LTTE operative who posed as a film director and is suspected to be the mastermind behind recent bomb attacks on civilian targets in and around Colombo was arrested by a special police team in Kotahena on Friday, a spokesman said yesterday.
The man is suspected to have acted as the handler of "suicide bombers" and was the main distributor of explosives for the terrorist network outside the north and east, Police spokesman Ranjith Gunasekera said.
He was tracked down following information gathered from a “Black Tiger” suicide squad member who was arrested a few days earlier in Wellawatta, Senior Superintendent Gunasekera said.
The man had been in possession of an identity card issued by the National Film Corporation identifying him as film director. The man owned a shop in the first floor of the Kotahena supermarket and he used this shop to give shelter to suicide cadres before they were sent out on their missions, the SSP said.
Police believe it was this 'film director' who sent the female suicide bomber on the mission that killed 14 people including 7 school boys of the D.S. Senanayake College at the Colombo Fort railway station on February 3 on the eve of the Independence Day celebrations, he said..
Earlier police had also found 9.5 kg of high explosives, a stock of detonators, steel balls weighing 1.5kg, and batteries with the suicide bomber arrested in Wellawatta.
He had also revealed that he was engaged in reconnaissance operations on VIP movements close to the Government Information Department at Narahenpita in the past few weeks.
The "Film Director" during interrogation had revealed that he was to participate in a cultural show at BMICH on Friday. The show was attended by Prime Minster Ratnasiri Wickremanayake and Media Minister Mahinda Yapa Abewardane, the spokesman said, adding that the suspect had manipulated matters to get an invitation from the Director of Cultural Department for this event.
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