President acknowledges serious lapse on part of IGP and Defence Sec; says both agreed to resign

President Sirisena acknowledged that there was a serious lapse on the part of Defence Secretary and Inspector General of Police (IGP), who failed to inform him about the intelligence agency letter from a "friendly foreign country" sent on April 4, warning about a possible attack.

Addressing media heads at President’s House in Colombo, the President said “IGP has sent that letter to Staff DIG and it was sent from table to table and finally it was forwarded to DIG Dissanayake of VIP Security, who, in turn, forwarded it to officers in-charge of security of VIPs protection."

"I was not informed. Neither my security head nor the head of Prime Minister’s security was informed. Both, Defence Secretary and IGP came to wish me on New Year Day (April 14) and they did not say a word about this warning letter. It was a serious lapse on their part and shirk of responsibility,” the President said.

President Sirisen said further said that he asked the IGP and the Defence Secretary to tender resignations immediately and they agreed to do so.

He added that an appropriate process will be implemented while completely reorganizing the security services including State Intelligence Service and Intelligence Units of the Police and Tri-forces, to prevent recurrence of these kinds of terrorist activities.  

Referring to the current operations, raids and arrests of suspects, he praised the law enforcement and intelligence services for their efficiency and dedication in responding to this situation. “The government has already been able to crack down on many criminals, suspects and those responsible for the recent attacks and many arrests have taken place. Therefore, I truly believe that we can avoid a repetition of such gruesome acts of violence in the future,” he said.

“I have already planned necessary actions to build an environment where the people of this country could live freely and without fear in the future.”

The Preisdent said security services received reports about this terrorist movement since 2015. It was observed that they were receiving training and certain guidance from foreign terrorist organizations. Our security services were monitoring them and investigating about them. However, our security services did not have enough evidence to start legal actions against them or clear information to be produced to courts, he said.

President Sirisena said he suspects that the terrorists, perhaps hastened the planned attack, because of the major campaign he launched against illicit drugs. “There is a nexus between international terrorism and the international drug trade. Furthermore, I got staunch support for anti-drugs campaign from His Eminence Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith, who joined us at Anti-Drug Walks. Perhaps the terrorist hastened the attacks on churches for these reasons”.