COLOMBO — Former Sri Lankan Cabinet Minister Patali Champika Ranawaka warned Monday that efforts are underway in the country’s Eastern Province to rebuild the Islamist extremist network led by Zahran Hashim, the mastermind of the 2019 Easter Sunday suicide bombings that killed more than 260 people.
Addressing a news conference in Colombo, Ranawaka said a figure identified only as “Siyam” has been appointed as the group’s new leader in the Kalmunai area and is actively working to reorganize the network.
“Recently, it was reported that a new leader has been appointed in the Kalmunai area to head Zahran’s group,” Ranawaka stated. “Through that leader, named Siyam, an attempt is being made to revive this organisation.”
He further alleged that several defendants acquitted just last week in the main trial over the Easter attacks have joined the re-emerging network, though he did not name individuals or provide supporting evidence beyond citing media reports. The claims have not been independently verified.
Last week, a three-judge High Court panel convicted 15 defendants on charges linked to the bombings and acquitted nine others. The Attorney General’s Department confirmed it will not appeal the acquittals — a decision Ranawaka appeared to criticise without explicitly naming the department.
The coordinated attacks on April 21, 2019, targeted three churches and three luxury hotels across the island. Hashim, leader of the National Thowheeth Jama’ath group, was among the suicide bombers.
Monitoring in Kalmunai Confirmed Earlier
Ranawaka’s comments follow remarks made in 2025 by Public Security Minister Ananda Wijepala, who confirmed intelligence agencies were monitoring an extremist group operating in the Eastern Province, with most activity centred on Kalmunai. Authorities have not formally linked the group identified by Wijepala to the network described by Ranawaka.
Ranawaka, who leads the United Republican Front and was a founding member of the Sinhala Buddhist nationalist party Jathika Hela Urumaya, accused the government of failing to act decisively as extremist movements re-emerge.
LTTE Commemoration Draws Criticism
The former minister also weighed in on the recent commemoration of Thileepan, a political leader of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam who died in 1987 while on hunger strike in Jaffna. He claimed the events were being used to “rehabilitate the image” of the separatist LTTE, which was defeated by government forces in 2009.
“We can see, through the Thileepan commemoration, attempts being made to give a humanitarian face to the LTTE organisation’s separatist brutality and to take steps toward strengthening LTTE separatism once again,” Ranawaka said.
Police removed a bust of Thileepan in Jaffna’s Nallur area on Sunday, shortly after the annual commemoration concluded. No official explanation was given for the removal.
Call for Balanced Counterterrorism Action
Ranawaka urged authorities to enforce counterterrorism powers to prevent groups from gaining a foothold, while acknowledging that the long-controversial Prevention of Terrorism Act requires urgent reform.
“Extremist movements that raise their heads here and there — whether Sinhala, Tamil, Muslim or of some other kind — must be immediately suppressed,” he said. “Our intelligence services and security forces must be kept on alert.”
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