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| Tuesday, 9 April 2002 |
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by Ravi Ladduwahetty Interior Minister John Ameratunga has directed the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) to recommence the investigations into the assault of Sunday Leader Editor-in-Chief Lasantha Wickrematunga, the attempted shooting incident at his house and also other incidents of assault and intimidation of journalists. This follows the assault of Mr. Wickrematunga almost outside his Mirihana residence on February 6, 1995 by masked assailants who came armed with clubs with spikes attached to them, where the Editor and his journalist wife Raine were pulled out of their car and brutally assaulted. The second incident was on the night of June 17, 1998 when the journalist couple had returned home after dinner when there was a spray of around 40 bullets were sprayed into the house. Other incidents of intimidation of journalists include the assault of journalists at Liberty Plaza, who covered the UNP protest march to Temple Trees on July 15 , 1999 where a large number of journalists and photographers were assaulted. "There have been two public petitions which have come to me with regard to Mr. Wickrematunga's incidents and as to why investigations have not been completed. There have been many representations which have been made to me regarding harassments of other journalists," Minister Ameratunga told the Daily News last night. It is indeed tragic that the probes which were said to have started immediately afterwards, have stopped halfway during the PA regime where the inquiring officers have been transferred. I have directed the CID to continue the probe and bring the offenders to court the Minister said. Mr. Wickrematunga, when contacted by the Daily News last night, said that it was also on record that the Director of the President's Security Division Nihal Karunaratne had told the Free Media Movement Convenor Waruna Karunatilake that Mr. Wickrematunga and Ravaya Editor Victor Ivan were on the 'hit list'. Mr. Karunaratne had said that on the day of President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga's re-swearing in ceremony at Temple Trees on December 23, 1999, the International Press Institute magazine had also published this quote and the statement had not been denied by either him or the Government. The Sunday Leader Editor-in-Chief said that probes conducted by his newspaper had also revealed that the four masked men who assaulted him and his wife on February 6, 1995 had arrived by van and were outside his house on the pretext of repairing it and that the gangsters had been led by the late Baddegana Sanjeewa. He had also written to the then IGP in 1998 about the inquiry and Mirihana OIC Saman Ratnayake who commenced the inquiry had been transferred to Vavuniya. He said that the fresh probe was also welcome, also in the light of Minister of Agriculture, Samurdhi and Livestock S.B. Dissanayake also alleging of a conspiracy in the President's House to kill him.
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