Sri Lanka sentences ex-police chief to death over 2019 bombings

COLOMBO - A Sri Lanka court sentenced former police chief Pujith Jayasundara to death on July 31 for failing to prevent the 2019 Easter Sunday bombings, which killed 279 people including 45 foreigners.In a majority decision, a three-judge bench ruled that the former inspector-general had failed in his duties to stop the deadly attacks, blamed on a homegrown Islamist extremist group.Jayasundara, 66, can appeal against his sentence in the Supreme Court.Sri Lanka has not carried out the death sentence since 1976, maintaining an unofficial moratorium on capital punishment.There are around 800 people on death row, according to government figures shared with Parliament in February, with sentences usually commuted to life imprisonment.The July 31 judgement at the special fast-track court came after the state appealed against a 2022 decision that acquitted Jayasundara as well as the defence secretary at the time of the attacks, Hemasiri Fernando.The court was told during the proceedings that an Indian intelligence agency had alerted Sri Lanka on April 4, 2019 to a possible suicide attack by Islamist extremists, but authorities failed to take action.The attacks on April 21 that year targeted three churches and three hotels.More than 500 people were wounded.Fernando and Jayasundara were arrested in 2019 and held in custody for four months before being released on bail.Prosecutors had earlier told the court that “negligence” by the two top officials amounted to “grave crimes against humanity” and laid murder charges against them.Jayasundara was eventually convicted of negligence leading to the death of 279 people.Jayasundara and Fernando had testified to a parliamentary inquiry that then-president Maithripala Sirisena failed to follow established protocols in assessing national security threats ahead of the bombings.They also alleged that Sirisena – who was also defence minister as well as law and order minister at the time – did not take the threats seriously. AFP