Sri Lanka arrests former top cop over plot to kill President

By APD writer Easwaran

COLOMBO, Oct 25 (APD) -- Sri Lanka's criminal police on Thursday arrested a former top police officer, who headed the terrorism investigations unit, over a plot to kill the President of the country.

Former Terrorist Investigations Department head, Nalaka de Silva was arrested by the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) after being questioned for several hours.

Nalaka de Silva was arrested

He was arrested after being questioned over an alleged conspiracy to assassinate President Maithripala Sirisena and other VVIPs.

Nalaka de Silva was remanded till November 7th after being produced before a Magistrate late on Thursday night.

An activist, Namal Kumara, had made the revelation to the media over the plot to kill the President, following a telephone conversation he had with Nalaka de Silva.

Namal Kumara released the audio recording of the telephone conversation and that led to an investigation being launched.

Nalaka de Silva was removed as the head of the Terrorist Investigations Department and was later suspended from the police till the investigations conclude.

The former DIG was questioned several times last week and this week by the CID before his arrest on Thursday.

The CID had also this week obtained permission from court to ask Chinese phone manufacturer Huawei to help recover data from the phone used by Namal Kumara.

(ASIA PACIFIC DAILY)