Plot to kill Gota hatched in Mutwal

by Hemantha Randunu
Police investigating an attempt on Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa’s life at Colpetty in December 2006 have established that terror strike had been planned by a group of senior LTTE members led by a priest at Mutwal.
It has also been found that the trishaw used in the attack had been fitted with a bomb at a religious place in Mutwal.
The police have ascertained details of the abortive assassination bid from a group of LTTE cadres including two women arrested in the Pettah recently while they were planning to launch an attack in Colombo. The police have traced a trishaw the LTTE had used to transport explosives for the December 2006 attack.
The police have detected C-4 explosives, detonators and arms concealed in a washing machine at the priest’s residence. A resident of Kilinochchi, he has been living in Mutwal with his wife for ten years.
The attack on the Defence Secretary, who was on his way to attend a National Security Council meeting at Temple Trees, was carried out by a male suicide bomber driving a red three wheeler. Two soldiers were killed in the blast and 18, including security forces personnel and civilians injured.