COLOMBO (NewsRadio); The Supreme Court is scheduled to announce the verdict in relation to the case filed against Former President Maithripala Sirisena and several others over failing to prevent the 2019 Easter Sunday attacks despite having prior intelligence information, today.
The case was heard before a seven-member bench headed by Chief Justice Jayantha Jayasuriya.
12 petitions were filed by the Bar Association of Sri Lanka, the families of the victims of the attacks, Catholic priests and several others.
Former President Maithripala Sirisena, former Inspector General of Police Pujith Jayasundara and former Secretary of Defence Hemasiri Fernando are among the respondents cited in the case.
A case has been filed separately before High Court against 25 individuals, including Naufer Maulavi, Sajeed Maulavi, Mohammad Milhan, Sadiq Abdullah, Adam Lebbe, Eliyas Gaufar Mama, Mohammad Sanas Deen, and Mohammad Rizwan, under 23,270 charges of conspiring and aiding and abetting the Easter Sunday bombings.
A total of 269 persons were killed in the bombings at three Catholic churches, three hotels in Colombo, a tourist inn and at a residence in Dematagoda on the 21st of April 2019.
More than 400 persons sustained injuries with several left disabled to date.
The terror group first targeted the St. Sebastian’s Church in Katana, Negombo, with the first bomb reported at 8:45am followed by blasts at the St. Anthony’s Shrine in Kochchikade, the Kingsbury Hotel, the Shangri-La Colombo, the Zion Church in Batticaloa and Cinnamon Grand, Colombo within a span of 30 minutes.
A bomb went off later that afternoon at a tourist inn in Dehiwela around 1:30pm.
Another two suicide attacks were reported soon after at a house in Dematagoda when security forces followed up on a lead over the attacks.
Later it was determined that the leader of the National Thowheed Jama’ath organisation and one of the suicide bombers Zahran Hashim was the mastermind who orchestrated the attacks.
A large number of individuals had been arrested and remanded since.
