No justice for Easter Sunday victims

Easter is a blessed festival for the believers the world over. For the faithful it marks the divinity of Jesus Christ and his resurrection. Yet since 2019, Easter in Sri Lanka is also marked with a tragic anniversary of a devastating terrorist attack that killed over 260 innocent people. The fact that there has not been any justice for the victims of that tragedy and that the perpetrators of that heinous act still remain at large without any accountability makes this anniversary even more tragic.

Even though four years have passed since the devastating Easter Sunday attacks on 21 April 2019, to date, not a single individual who perpetrated the crime or those who ought to have prevented the crime have been held accountable. The only marginal victory marked in this long road for justice is the Supreme Court ordering former president Maithripala Sirisena to pay Rs. 100 million as compensation for the victims of the tragedy. Sirisena was not found guilty of negligence because he was not prosecuted for the crime of criminal negligence. The Court verdict was delivered on a fundamental rights case filed by a citizen and not a criminal case prosecuted by the Attorney General. While there was never the case of criminal liability in a fundamental rights case, this judgment is at least significant in holding someone accountable for negligence.

The more disturbing developments are regarding credible accusations that State agencies were involved in this attack. In a fundamental rights petition to the Supreme Court in February 2022, former director of the Criminal Investigation Division (CID), SSP Abeysekera made several chilling revelations that directly implied links between the Easter Sunday bombers and several state intelligence agencies. He also claims that there was serious interference by these agencies into the CID investigations into the terrorist group’s operations in the lead up to the Easter attacks. To this date SSP Abeysekera’s submissions to the Courts have been challenged or even publicly Not Been Refuted by a government entity.

Even though there is no evidence to directly link former President Gotabaya Rajapaksa to the crime, there is no doubt that he was the biggest beneficiary of the atrocity. Within a week of the attacks, the former secretary of defence announced his candidacy for president. The whole campaign of candidate Rajapaksa was divisive, ethno-nationalist and based on a fear psychosis of a threat to national security in the wake of Easter attacks. One of the pivotal pillars of the mandate received by the ex-President Rajapaksa was to bring the perpetrators of that crime to justice. Yet, having been elected on a national security and law and order ticket, President Rajapaksa never delivered on his promise to bring the perpetrators of this crime to justice.

His successor, President Ranil Wickremesinghe has also shown little interest in pursuing justice for this crime. It is possibly over his own neglect as prime minister in 2019 when he claimed that he was left out of national security matters by then President Sirisena. Whatever the motives may be the abysmal failure of the Sri Lankan judiciary to deliver justice to the victims of this crime is now evident. The perpetrators and those who were criminally negligent in preventing this crime must be held accountable. In this regard if the local criminal justice system continues to fail in its duty there is no other choice but to seek international action in the quest for justice. Until there is some justice for the victims of this tragedy there will never be a Happy Easter in this country ever again.