The probe on the 2019 Easter bombing in Sri Lanka saw a new development. Rishad Bathiyudeen, the arrested former minister of Sri Lanka and his brother would be detained for 90 days. The police said that their detention would be under the stiff anti-terrorism law in order to conduct further probe into the role of the duo, allegedly aiding and abetting the suicide bombers who were responsible for the deadly Easter Sunday attacks of 2019.
Rishad who was a former minister of Industry and commerce is also the leader of a minority muslim party, All Ceylon Makkal Congress. The ACMC is a part of the main opposition party Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB). He & his brother Riyaj Bathiyudeen were arrested on April 24 from their respective places of residence.
As per a senior police official, Rishad and Riyaj were arrested because of scrutiny of bank accounts, cheque transactions, and tapping of their communication lines. Riyaj was earlier arrested twice last year. The first arrest in May 2020, was for contacting the suicide bombers who took part in the 2019 Easter attack, after which he was given bail in October. The second arrest was made in the same month-October on misappropriation of state resources. He got bail in November. The investigation on the 2019 Easter attack had been focused on the close contacts of the suicide bombers, who were coordinating from behind the scenes. The police stated that the attackers died, but the attention of the police has been towards those who motivated them.
In the infamous Easter Sunday attack on April 21, 2019, three churches and three luxury hotels in Colombo were targeted by coordinated Islamic suicide bombings. The attacks came as a consequence of the radicalization of certain discontented segments of Muslim population in the country. The radicalization has been a result of foreigners arriving in the country, which was described by Justice minister Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe as Islamic extremism. Three years before the attacks, Hilmy Ahamed had warned the country’s military intelligence officials regarding the National Thawheed Jama’ath (NTJ) which was targeting the non-Muslim community. NTJ is known to have links with ISIS and has been implicated in the 2019 bombings. Six days after the attack, there was a clash between NTJ operatives and police when a safehouse of the outfit was raided. In that clash, 15 operatives, which included 6 children were killed and three operatives blew themselves up after being cornered.
A total of 274 people were killed along with 542 people getting injured in the Easter Sunday attack of 2019. Among the dead, 11were Indians. Lawyers of Rishad claimed that the arrest was politically motivated. This is because the special presidential panel to probe the 2019 Easter attack had not named the brothers for aiding and abetting the Islamic extremists.
