Sri Lankan court hands convictions for 2019 Easter terrorist attack

A court in Sri Lanka has convicted 15 men on terrorist charges over their involvement in one of the country’s worst terror attacks, which killed more than 260 people at popular tourist sites back in 2019 during the busy Christian Easter holiday weekend.

A three-judge bench of the High Court in Colombo found 15 of the suspects guilty of more than 23,000 charges, as reported by Indian media, including murder, conspiracy to carry out terrorist attacks, and possession of firearms and explosives. 

The attacks were carried out by nine suicide bombers, all of whom died in the blasts, meaning none of those who directly participated survived.

Authorities initially arrested 25 suspects accused of planning the attacks, all of them members of Sri Lanka’s Muslim community. Nine others were eventually released.

Two Sri Lanka-based Islamic militant groups, National Thowfeek Jamaath and Jamathei Millathu Ibrahim, were accused of carrying out the bombings. However, NTJ has not admitted responsibility for the wave of attacks that tore through the island. At the time, the Islamic State (ISIS) said its militants were responsible, although those claims have not been verified.

The coordinated blasts struck three churches and three luxury hotels. They were the deadliest attacks in Sri Lanka since the end of the country’s civil war in 2009, killing 270 people. Among them were many locals, particularly children, as well as 45 foreigners from countries including Australia, Bangladesh, China, Denmark, Japan, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and Türkiye.

Three of the victims were later identified as the children of Denmark’s richest person, fashion retail mogul Anders Holch Povlsen, who was vacationing with his wife and four children at one of the luxury resorts.

Conspiracy theories unleash political earthquake

In the aftermath of the attacks, Sri Lankan authorities pointed to a “major intelligence lapse”. Parliament heard that a warning from India about the planned attacks had not been properly shared with the relevant authorities, as recalled in coverage by the BBC.

In 2023, the Supreme Court ordered former President Maithripala Sirisena to pay millions in compensation to victims of the bombings after finding him responsible for national security failures that contributed to the attacks.

Last month, Pujith Jayasundara, the former head of police, and Hemasiri Fernando, who was Defence Secretary at the time, were sentenced to death for criminal negligence that led to the bombings. Death sentences are usually commuted to life imprisonment in Sri Lanka because of a decades-old moratorium on executions.

The latest verdict comes as a separate investigation into former intelligence chief Suresh Sallay continues. Sallay is accused of orchestrating the bombings with Islamist extremists.

The allegations echo those raised in a 2023 documentary by British broadcaster Channel 4, which featured whistleblower testimony claiming the attacks were allowed to happen to boost the popularity of the Rajapaksa family, which had long dominated Sri Lankan politics.

Former President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, who was elected months after the 2019 attacks on a campaign focused on tackling Islamist extremism, has also denied the allegations. Rajapaksa, who has been banned from leaving the country, has asked the court to prevent his potential arrest in connection with the ongoing investigations.

By Nazrin Sadigova