Sri Lanka's opposition JVP asks govt to share details on alleged bomb threat

Colombo: Sri Lanka’s opposition Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) on Monday urged the government to share the details of an alleged bomb threat as outlined in a reported communique between the police chief and the defense ministry secretary ahead of the Black Tiger Day marked by the LTTE on July 5.

JVP leader Anura Kumara Dissanayake told reporters that Police chief CD Wickremaratna had addressed Defence Ministry Secretary Kamal Gunaratne in a letter dated June 27 and alerted him to the alleged threat.

Dissanayake claimed that an unidentified foreign intelligence service was to carry out an explosion in either the north and east regions or in the south to mark the Black Tiger day on either July 5 or 6. He, however, did not name the foreign agency.

Accordingly, all employees of foreign establishments located in Jaffna and VIPs have been advised to stay indoors on two days, according to the information provided by the police chief to the defense ministry secretary in the said letter.

Dissanayake urged the government to provide full details as to how the information came to be gathered or if this was an attempt by the government to curb the raging public protests against it over the current economic and fuel crisis.

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) during their 30-year campaign to set up a separate Tamil state in the north and east regions commemorated the Black Tiger Week in early July marking their first suicide bomb attack by their cadre termed ‘Captain Miller on July 5, 1987.

The government in the past beefed up security on July 5 every year across the country to prevent attacks by the LTTE to mark the event until the militant group was militarily defeated in May 2009. The Tamils have alleged that thousands were massacred during the final stages of the war that ended in 2009 when the government forces killed LTTE chief Velupillai Prabhakaran. in April 2019, a local Islamist extremist group linked to the ISIS, had carried out coordinated blasts that tore through three churches and as many luxury hotels in Sri Lanka, killing at least 270 people, and injuring over 500.