Sri Lanka church maintains skepticism over Easter Sunday bombing investigation

The Catholic church in Colombo expresses dissatisfaction with the Sri Lankan government's investigations into the 2019 Easter Sunday bombings that killed 270 people, including Indians. Spokesman Fr Cyril Gamini Fernando presented a questionnaire to police linking military intelligence to the local jihadi group responsible for the attacks. With elections approaching, opposition parties pledge to reopen the case.

The Catholic church here on Saturday reiterated its dissatisfaction over the nature of the investigations conducted by the Sri Lankan government in connection with the 2019 Easter Sunday bombings that killed 270 people, including Indians.

Fr Cyril Gamini Fernando, the spokesman for the church, told reporters that he had presented a questionnaire to the police that had provided important information about the investigation.

Fernando, who was summoned to the police’s CID on Friday to record a statement over his public expression of dissatisfaction over the investigation, said the 8-point questionnaire pins police to investigate the alleged links between certain sections of the military intelligence with the local jihadi group, which carried out the attacks.

His comments came ahead of the church’s commemoration of the victims on its fourth anniversary falling on Sunday.

With major elections starting from later in the year, the most politically important issue of the 2019 Easter Sunday attacks has once again come to the fore.

The two major opposition parties last week separately met the Archbishop of Colombo Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, a bitter critic of the investigations. Both parties have pledged to reopen the case with permanent arms to handle the fresh probe.

Nine suicide bombers belonging to the local Islamist extremist group, the National Thowheeth Jama'ath (NTJ) linked to ISIS carried out a series of devastating blasts that tore through three Catholic churches and as many luxury hotels on April 21, 2019, killing nearly 270 people, including 11 Indians, and injuring over 500.

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