By M.R. Narayan Swamy
If the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) government is to be believed, it has uncovered a treacherous Kim Philby, the Cold War's most infamous double agent, in Sri Lanka, who committed a bloody horror against the country and its people.
No, Suresh Sallay did not send trained agents behind the now routed Tamil Tiger lines to die; far worse, he colluded with the Islamic State to orchestrate a string of bomb attacks that killed around 260 people on Easter Day in 2019. Some of the dead were foreigners.
But unlike Philby, who escaped behind the Iron Curtain before he could be caught, Sallay, a former head of the powerful State Intelligence Service (SIS), is in custody – and condemned by the powers that be for the atrocious deed.
While Sallay dismisses the allegations as a fabrication, the JVP government says it has sufficient evidence to prosecute a man who enjoyed the complete confidence of former President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and was among the most influential figures in Sri Lanka's security establishment.
The prosecution's case is that the April 21, 2019, bombings at luxury hotels and churches were carried out because Sallay wanted to create mass fear, enabling Gotabaya Rajapaksa, who enjoyed a macho image after crushing the Tamil Tigers a decade earlier, to sweep to power.
That did happen. Gotabaya swept the elections held months later. And he promptly picked Sallay, a liberal Muslim and a former head of the Military Intelligence, to steer the SIS – the country’s main intelligence agency.
Until Gotabaya was ousted from power in 2022 following mass protests triggered by the country’s economic collapse, Sallay was his most trusted official, a virtual Man Friday. Ministers from that era acknowledge this.
At the heart of the current case is another Sri Lankan Muslim, Mohammed Milhilar Mohammed Hanzeer alias Azad Maulana, who claims to be a witness to secret meetings between Sallay and members of the Sri Lankan affiliate of the Islamic State, which claimed responsibility for the Easter bloodbath.
Maulana also blamed his former boss, Tamil Tiger-turned-politician Sivanesathurai Chandrakanthan alias Pillaiyaan, a former chief minister of Sri Lanka’s eastern province and a political ally of the Rajapaksa brothers.
Pillaiyaan is also behind bars, but on an unrelated murder charge. And he was in prison on the day the Islamic State struck.
Maulana made the startling disclosures about Sallay and Pillaiyaan to officials in Switzerland after fleeing Sri Lanka in late 2019 and while seeking asylum in that idyllic country in Europe.
The allegations remained whispers until they were broadcast by Britain's Channel 4 television network, triggering a political tsunami in Sri Lanka.
The JVP, which was in political ascendency, lost no time in echoing Maulana’s narrative, which had the support of a vocal section of the Catholic church in Sri Lanka.
Less than two years after the JVP formed a government, Sallay was arrested on February 25 under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA), a draconian legislation which the spy master had used for years both to detain and allegedly torture scores of government opponents.
There are plots within plots in the Sallay story, akin to a Bollywood blockbuster.
Before the Easter bombs exploded in Sri Lanka, the Indian intelligence sent multiple messages to its counterpart in Colombo warning about the impending disaster – and naming the suspects, the places which could be hit, and even the precise date when blood would be spilled. It remains a mystery how the Indians got this windfall.
Coincidentally, Sallay was in New Delhi then attending a months-long military course to which foreigners from friendly countries are invited.
And one of the men who reportedly ignored the intelligence warnings in 2019 was Shani Abeseykara, who headed the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) at the time of the bombings.
In 2020, the Gotabaya Rajapaksa administration first demoted and then arrested Shani Abeysekara. While in custody, he suffered a heart attack and contracted COVID-19. His supporters say it was a miracle that he survived the ordeal.
After being acquitted by the courts, Abeysekara joined the National People's Power (NPP) — of which the JVP is its core— and became an active politician.
When the NPP came to power in 2024, Abeysekara was reappointed as Director of the Criminal Investigation Department on a contract basis. It was, arguably, the first time in Sri Lankan history that a politician had returned to head a major state investigative agency.
The CID — now headed by Abeysekara — is alleged to have subjected Sallay to such severe physical and psychological mistreatment that he launched a hunger strike on June 5.
As his health rapidly deteriorated, and his family claimed he could die, the government hurriedly rushed him to the emergency wing of a leading Colombo hospital, where he is now taking only saline, while continuing his protest fast.
Sallay, his family says, is okay with the case and interrogation but does not want to be in CID custody. But Abeseykara, who believed Sallay was the cause of his earlier trauma, is refusing to give up. They are now bitter foes.
While Sallay has plenty of admirers in Sri Lanka for conducting covert operations against the Tamil Tigers, there are many others who intensely dislike him over his alleged high-handed treatment of government critics.
But even those who are no admirers of Sallay find it difficult to believe that he could have joined hands with Islamists to kill and maim hundreds, simply to get Gotabaya re-elected.
In any case, the government that preceded Gotabaya Rajapaksa was so dysfunctional — the President and the Prime Minister were barely on speaking terms — that it could have been defeated without bombs or mass-casualty attacks.
In any case, the words that asylum seeker Maulana has attributed to Sallay during alleged secret meetings in Sri Lanka's east with the prospective Islamist bombers make his claims suspect in the eyes of many, including diplomats.
But the government is clearly placing considerable weight on Maulana's testimony. Shani Abeysekara, the head of the CID, travelled to the Sri Lankan Embassy in France to record his statement.
Yes, the Easter bombings helped Gotabaya to sweep the elections. But to allude that Gotabaya is part of the conspiracy is akin to alleging that Lyndon Johnson probably had a hand in John Kennedy’s death, so that he could be the next president of the US.
It is also true that Gotabaya Rajapaksa's public announcement of his presidential candidacy within days of the Easter bombings was not a politically wise move.
Then, those in the know in Colombo say that his elder brother, former President Mahinda Rajapaksa — a political animal to the core — had privately voiced disgust at Gotabaya Rajapaksa's decision to announce his presidential candidacy within days of the Easter bombings, warning that it could one day land him in trouble.
Does Maulana have photographic or electronic evidence to back his claims against Sallay, Pillaiyaan, and, by extension, Gotabaya? He has said he will not return to Sri Lanka.
There are other questions too.
If the government does have irrefutable evidence, why doesn’t it take Sallay to court and convict him? Why should the ministers spew fire only in parliament?
And even if charges are filed against Sallay, can they stand scrutiny in a court of law?
When Maulana flew out of Colombo in late 2019 apparently fearing for his life, no one could have imagined that the allegations he would make in faraway Switzerland would cause a political explosion in Sri Lanka, the incumbent government treating a once-trusted intelligence chief as a national traitor.
