{"id":70378,"date":"2020-09-21T19:30:52","date_gmt":"2020-09-22T00:30:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=70378"},"modified":"2020-09-21T19:31:16","modified_gmt":"2020-09-22T00:31:16","slug":"former-president-maithripala-sirisena-never-instructed-the-national-security-council-to-arrest-ntj-leader-zahran-hashim-during-his-tenure-as-defence-secretary-between-november-2018-and-april-2019-ex","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=70378","title":{"rendered":"Former President Maithripala Sirisena never instructed the National Security Council  to arrest NTJ leader Zahran Hashim during his tenure as Defence Secretary between November 2018 and April 2019, Ex-Def Secy  Hemasiri Fernando tells the Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Rathindra Kuruwita<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Only the President had the power to give directions at the National Security Council (NSC) and former President Maithripala Sirisena never instructed those who attended its meetings to arrest NTJ leader Zahran Hashim during his tenure as Defence Secretary between November 2018 and April 2019, Hemasiri Fernando, yesterday, told the Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI) investigating the Easter Sunday attacks.<\/p>\n<p>Fernando added that he had taken over as the Defence Secretary in November 2018 and no one had any idea where Zahran was hiding. If they could have arrested Zahran in 2018, the attack could have been prevented.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn 2018, the TID looked for Zahran. This operation was stopped. Otherwise, the TID might have arrested him.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Asked by a Commissioner who had stopped the TID\u2019s investigations, Fernando said that the incident had taken place during the time of his predecessor. \u201cThe former IGP is to start testifying on September 24 and I think it\u2019s better if this evidence comes from him,\u201d Fernando said.<\/p>\n<p>The Attorney General\u2019s Department (AGD) official who led the evidence asked Fernando if he was aware that the State Intelligence Service (SIS) had reported on a number of Zahran sightings and his possible whereabouts. Fernando said that focusing on such matters was not a part of his duties.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is not my concern. I was the supervising officer. Supervisors don\u2019t arrest people. It was not my job.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Fernando was then asked how he had contacted former President Maithripala Sirisena when the latter was out of Colombo. \u201cI was hardly in contact with him at all, and, therefore, that was not a problem for me,\u201d the witness said.<\/p>\n<p><em>Courtesy:The Island<\/em><\/p>\n<div id=\"tweetbutton70378\" class=\"tw_button\" style=\"float:right;margin-left:10px;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/share?url=https%3A%2F%2Fdbsjeyaraj.com%2Fdbsj%2F%3Fp%3D70378&amp;text=Former%20President%20Maithripala%20Sirisena%20never%20instructed%20the%20National%20Security%20Council%20%20to%20arrest%20NTJ%20leader...%20&amp;related=&amp;lang=en&amp;count=horizontal\" class=\"twitter-share-button\"  style=\"width:55px;height:22px;background:transparent url('https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/wp-content\/plugins\/wp-tweet-button\/tweetn.png') no-repeat  0 0;text-align:left;text-indent:-9999px;display:block;\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Rathindra Kuruwita Only the President had the power to give directions at the National Security Council (NSC) and former President Maithripala Sirisena never instructed those who attended its meetings to arrest NTJ leader Zahran Hashim during his tenure as Defence Secretary between November 2018 and April 2019, Hemasiri Fernando, yesterday, told the Presidential Commission &#8230;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=70378\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading &lsquo;Former President Maithripala Sirisena never instructed the National Security Council  to arrest NTJ leader Zahran Hashim during his tenure as Defence Secretary between November 2018 and April 2019, Ex-Def Secy  Hemasiri Fernando tells the Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI)&rsquo; &raquo;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[12],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70378"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=70378"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70378\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":70380,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70378\/revisions\/70380"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=70378"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=70378"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=70378"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}