රාවයට කරන ලද අනතුරු ඇගවීමක්ද
After a smoke bomb attack on Ravaya, the Media Minister condemned it and ordered an inquiry. The piece reads the attack as a warning linked to state media’s anti-Ravaya campaign and to government circles that see the paper as leading efforts to topple it, and recalls the attacks on Lasantha Wickrematunge and the murders of Rohana Kumara and Nimalarajan, after which similar promises produced nothing.
බියගැන්වීමේ දේශපාලනය
A severed head and hand from a corpse were delivered to the homes of UNP MP Ravi Karunanayake’s wife and mother, an evident warning to an active opposition politician. The piece notes that the police have not traced the body, likely taken from a morgue, recalls how political interference stalled the Rohana Kumara, Kumar Ponnambalam and Nimalarajan murder inquiries, and says intimidation is as brutal as killing and incompatible with democracy.
රෝහණ කුමාර ඝාතනය ෂෝ වික්රමසිංහ
Ivan describes a meeting he, Lasantha Wickrematunge, Varuna Karunatilake and Ravaya’s Chapa Bandara had with CID director Bandula ‘Shaw’ Wickramasinghe over the Rohana Kumara murder. The talk ended when they showed that suspect Thara Ajith was arrested at the home of Presidential Security Division man Beddagane Sanjeewa. Ivan argues the confessions of Thara Ajith and Moratuwa Saman are designed to shield the government before the election.
අවසානයක් නොදුටු ඝාතන සංස්කෘතිය
Ivan details the political crime network behind the killings of Satana editor Rohana Kumara and Kumar Ponnambalam: gunman ‘Moratuwa Saman’, associates sheltered by a cabinet minister’s residence and an Urban Development Authority flat, and links to Beddagane Sanjeewa of the Presidential Security Division. He describes police interference, the reversal by investigator Shaw Wickramasinghe, a failed first attempt on Rohana Kumara, and the car and pistol used, concluding that small-scale state-backed killing continues.
පොන්නම්බලම් ඝාතනයේ ඇත්ත යටපත් වීමට ඉඩ නොතැබිය යුතුය
The editorial recalls that Ravaya named the criminal ‘Moratuwa Saman’, arrested on 6 April, as Kumar Ponnambalam’s killer and linked a reserve police constable holding the victim’s phone. Senior police officer Bandula Wickramasinghe first blamed the LTTE and now says the constable ordered the killing, apparently to close the case. It demands that police identify the political hand behind the murder and the Rohana Kumara killing.
Why president’s office sent an angry reply to me
There is no disgrace for an elephant who breaks his tusks on a diamond rock. Reading the reply the President’s office sent to his answer to her January interview, Ivan writes, he felt they were living in an abuddassa age, in which the diamond rock pursues the elephant in anger and hatred.
A new age of terror
The government called the harassment of the singers Rukantha Gunatilaka and Chandralekha Perera a robbery, and the levelling of Anoja Weerasinghe’s house at Moneragala a personal grudge. Set those explanations beside each other, Ivan argues, and a pattern appears that the country has seen before.
යළි මරණ බිය රජ කරන යුගයක්
Ivan rejects the government’s explanation of the attacks on Rookantha Gunathilake, Chandralekha Perera and Anoja Weerasinghe as robbery or private feud, comparing the haircutting to the abduction of Lakbima’s Sri Lal Priyantha and recalling unsolved attacks on photographers, Sarath Kongahage and Lasantha Wickrematunge and the murders of Rohana Kumara and Kumar Ponnambalam. He quotes Chandrika Kumaratunga’s 1994 advertisement pledging to end state terror and says she now travels the opposite road.