BATTICALOA, Sri Lanka: Sri Lanka's Terrorism Investigation Division has ordered Tharmalingam Suresh, the national organiser of the Tamil National People's Front, to come to Colombo for questioning about a photograph posted on his Facebook account.
Officers from the division went to Mr. Suresh's home in Batticaloa at about 12:45 p.m. on Sunday and handed the summons to family members who were there, according to the party.
The order is handwritten in Tamil on a standard Sri Lanka Police message form. It tells Mr. Suresh to appear at the division's offices in Colombo 01 at 9:30 a.m. on Wednesday, Nov. 4, so that investigators can record a statement about a photograph "related to the LTTE" posted on his Facebook account. Jaffna Monitor has seen a copy of the order. The order does not describe the photograph, say when it was posted, or accuse Mr. Suresh of any offence.
The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, the separatist group defeated by government forces in 2009, is still banned in Sri Lanka.
In a statement posted on social media, the Tamil National People's Front called the summons "state terrorism" by the Dissanayake government. The party said intimidation and repression of Tamil nationalist activists had "not changed one bit" under his administration. "We strongly condemn these repressive measures," the statement said.
Mr. Suresh is also a vice president of the All Ceylon Tamil Congress, the main party in the Front. He has worked on the official staff of the Front's leader, Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam, a member of Parliament for Jaffna.
He has been questioned by the division before. In October 2025, investigators questioned him for about five hours over a social media post he was alleged to have shared several years earlier. Mr. Ponnambalam said then that the questioning focused on an allegation that his party was using memorial events to regroup the Tamil Tigers. He wrote on X: "So much for system change! The NPP is as rotten as its predecessors!"
Mr. Dissanayake's National People's Power coalition came to power in 2024 promising to abolish the Prevention of Terrorism Act. The act has been criticised for decades by rights groups, which say it has been used against Tamils, Muslims and government critics. On Oct. 6, Justice Minister Harshana Nanayakkara presented the Protection of the State from Terrorism Bill to Parliament to repeal and replace it. The Supreme Court began hearing petitions against the bill on Oct. 20, and journalists' groups and other protesters in Colombo have called for it to be withdrawn. The existing act remains in force while the bill is pending.
The summons comes three weeks before Nov. 27, when Tamils in the north and east remember Tamil Tiger fighters killed in the war.
