UNP bomb blast suspects further remanded

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 31 May 2000, 16:47 GMT]
Four suspects, described as the chief organizers of the UNP in the Batticaloa district, were Tuesday further remanded till June 13 by the Colombo Chief Magistrate and Additional District Judge D.G.Kulatilleke who is conducting the Magisterial inquiry into the Town Hall bomb blast on December 18, 1999.

The four suspects, Sinnathamby Kadirgamer, K.Vigneswaran, T.Baptis and Sathiamoorthy Rajan of Batticaloa, all supported UNP candidate Ranil Wickremasinghe during the last Presidential election.

Senior State Counsel Yasantha Kodagoda who appeared for the Attorney General with the officials of the CID yesterday filed a further report in connection with the ongoing investigations and said that the CID had not completed the investigations under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA).

Mr. Kodagoda said that the four suspects were taken into custody for allegedly conspiring to commit the ofence. He moved court to remand the suspects in custody until the completion of the investigations.

If the investigations revealed that the four suspects had no connection with the offence, the CID will move court to discharge the suspects from the proceedings, the Senior State Counsel told court. Mr. Joseph Charles, who appeared for the suspects with Mr. Angelo Benedict, objected to the Senior State Counsel's application and said that the reports before court had not an iota of evidence against his clients to remand them to custody.

Mr.Charles, moving for a discharge of the suspects citing several authorities, said that the allegations made against his clients were baseless.