|
|
Contents |
A major purge of top police officers in the government's anti-terrorism unit Ñ the Crime Detective Bureau Ñ has been ordered in the midst of a security red alert in Colombo city and preparations for next month's local elections.
Senior Superintendent Lionel Gunatillake, Director of the CDB, Chief Inspector M. M. Nilabdeen and SI Jeyeratnam have been removed from their posts with immediate effect.
SSP Gunatillake has been transferred to Police Headquarters while CI Nilabdeen and SI Jeyaratnam have been interdicted.
SSP Gunatillake whose father was also in the police force and his brother, Nimal the present SSP serving in Jaffna, is considered one of the best detectives. Before being appointed to the top post in the CDB five years ago, he served in the Field Forces Headquarters.
Chief Inspector Nilabdeen who has been serving at the CDB headquarters for several years has played a key role in the detection of LTTE suspects in the city. CI Nilabdeen and SI Jeyaratnam had been recently promoted for their detection of a large haul of RDX explosives from an LTTE safe house at Wellawatte.
No official communiqué has been released by the Police Dept. or the Defence Ministry but the purge comes in the aftermath of an LTTE suspect in CDB custody being produced before the Lalith Athulathmudali Commission last Thursday.
The suspect Kauseelan is reported to have confessed to being an accomplice of Ragunathan, a suspect in the assassination of Lalith Athulathmudali in April 1993. At the Commission Kauseelan said CDB officers had forced him to make a false confession.
Defence Secretary Chandrananda de Silva later ordered that Kauseelan be transferred out of CDB custody to the Magazine Prison.
According to CDB sources, Kauseelan was arrested on his way to Udappuwa to organise an LTTE transit point to smuggle explosives and other items through Mullaitivu to Colombo.
They claimed the suspect had been interrogated and had confessed to have known Ragunathan who had been named as the assassin of Mr. Athulathmudali. However, when the suspect was summoned before the ongoing Athulathmudali Commission he had alleged the statement had been taken under duress.
In what is seen as a major blow to the People's Alliance, the New Democratic United National Lalith Front (NDUNLF), led by Minister Srimani Athulathmudali which polled a high percentage of votes in the last elections - has decided to go it alone in the March 27 local polls, a party spokesman said.
Party Secretary, T.M.S. Nanayakkara said the PA had decided that the NDUNLF would not be allowed to field even a single candidate in seven of the 17 districts for which elections were to be held, despite long and intense negotiations. In 10 districts the allocation given to the NDUNLF was only around two per cent of the total number of candidates he complained.
Other NDUNLF sources said apart from the dispute over the number of candidates the party was also concerned about the failure of the PA to keep its election pledges.
The NDUNLF decision is expected to significantly change the political equation of the elections, especially in the Western province where Ms. Athulathmudali's party is known to be strong. Three days ago the PA pulled off a political coup by persuading Colombo's UNP Mayor K. Ganeshalingam to come forward as an independent candidate backed by the PA. If Mr. Ganeshalingam's move could split the UNP vote then Ms. Athulathmudali's move could also split the PA votes, political analysts said.
Meanwhile the PA and the UNP has appointed district co-ordinators for the polls. President Chandrika Kumaratunga will personally oversee the election activities in the Gampaha district where her brother, Anura Bandaranaike is the UNP organiser.
The Colombo district PA chief will be Health Minister, A.H.M. Fowzie. The PA General Secretary and Agricultural Minister D.M. Jayaratne will be in charge of the Kandy district while Minister, Anuruddha Ratwatte will oversee Matale. Minister Nimal Siripala de Silva will be in charge of Badulla.
The UNP has set up a special committee to co-ordinate its election activities from its headquarters at Siri Kotha.
No immediate legal action against former owners of seven companies revested with the government could be taken for alleged mismanagement and ripping off valuable assets, Attorney General Sarath Silva said.
"Although these companies were once public property and were handled in a bad way by some of the owners after they were privatised, we can't take action against them because they owned the assets at that stage," he said.
Mr. Silva said these companies had been sold below market value to people who did not have much knowledge or experience in the relevant field.
"Some of them have bought the companies with the idea of ripping off the assets. This has led to retrenchment and other problems," he said.
These companies have been taken back by the government on a presidential decree made under the Rehabilitation of Privatized Public Enterprises Law.
The seven companies re-vested with the government are: Hingurana Sugar Corporation, Kantale Sugar Factory, Sri Lanka State Trading (Hardware) Corporation (Lanka Loha), Kahatagaha Mines, Colombo Fertilizer Corporation - Hunupitiya, Mattegama Textiles.
Former CWC General Secretary M. S. Sellasamy has vowed that his new party would give a tough fight to the CWC at the coming elections.
Mr. Sellasamy who was expelled from the CWC about three years ago and has formed the Ceylon National Workers Congress said his party was negotiating with both the PA and the UNP to work out some electoral arrangement.
After serving for decades as General Secretary of Sri Lanka's most powerful plantation union, Mr. Sellasamy was expelled from the CWC in the wake of a clash with its leader S. Thondaman.
Mr. Sellasamy has filed legal action against his expulsion and the judgement in this case, expected to be delivered tomorrow, might have a bearing on party alliances at the local polls.
The United States said on Friday no notable headway had been made by the Sri Lankan government with regard to investigations into the mass graves at Sooriyakanda, Ankumbura and Nikaweratiya.
The People's Alliance Government came to office in 1994 promising to bring to justice the perpetrators of extra-judicial killings allegedly committed by members of the security forces. But there were no developments in the government investigations into the mass graves at Sooriyakanda, which contains an estimated 300 bodies or the grave at Ankumbura, which is thought to contain the bodies of 36 people killed by the police in 1989, the US States Department said in its annual Human Rights Report for 1996.
The report said there were also no developments in the Nikaweratiya army camp incident in which 20 youths were alleged to have been killed by soldiers in the same year.
Moreover, 22 members of the STF who were arrested and detained in October 1995 on suspicion of murdering 23 Tamil youths whose bodies were found floating in Bolgoda Lake and in some other waterways near Colombo were released on bail and they resumed their police functions in February last year, the US said.
"In July the charred body of a Tamil textile merchant who had been detained under Emergency Regulations was found at Giribawa in the North Central Province. Six police officers, including the Officer-in-Charge of the police counter-subversive unit in Vavuniya were arrested and detained under the ER. In both cases, the police investigation was submitted to the Attorney General's Department, which had not yet made any recommendations to the High Court by year's end. In the case of the Bolgoda Lake killings, problems with the government's evidence have reportedly contributed to the delay," the report said.
The US said there were also no developments in the investigations into the October 1994 suicide bombing that killed the UNP's presidential candidate Gamini Dissanayake and 58 others.
According to the report, over 300 people are believed to have disappeared in the Jaffna peninsula in the second half of last year and more than 50 elsewhere in the country throughout the year but the government has not identified or charged those responsible for disappearances during the year.
Please send your comments and suggestions on this web site to
info@suntimes.is.lk or to
webmaster@infolabs.is.lk
