EXPOSED BY A CLUMSY POLICE RAID ON ARMY SAFE HOUSE - ONE INTELLIGENCE CHIEF KILLED; TWO SPIES KIDNAPPED By Walter Jayawardhana from Los Angeles

Thanks to the wide publicity given to a clumsy police raid on a safe house of the military intelligence unit of the Sri Lanka Army at Athurugiriya at least one person serving that unit had been killed by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam in Batticaloa, and many more are in mortal danger, army sources revealed.

The same sources said two more spies serving the unit had been also kidnapped by the Tamil Tigers as a result of the exposure of the raid conducted by Police Superintendent Kulasiri Udugampola backed by the Interior Minister John Ameratunga.

The premises in Millennium Park, Athurugiriya, where the raid took place were rented by the Sri Lanka Army, as a safe house for a unit of the Long Range Reconnaissance Patrol (LRRP) run under the Directorate of Military Intelligence. A police team led by Udugampola raided on the house and arrested the army captain who was in charge of the unit and five soldiers including a former member of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, who had now joined the unit. The unit was part of a highly successful program by the Sri Lanka Army to penetrate deep into the Tiger territory and assassinate LTTE leaders. Many such as the self-styled Colonel Shanker, a confidante of the Tiger leader Velupillai Prabhakaran had been killed by the LRRP.

Army commander Lt. General Lionel Balagalle dispatched his Director of Military Intelligence Brigadier Kapila Hendavitharana to avoid the clumsy arrest of the very efficient long-range unit from being taken away to be locked up. Hendavitharana reportedly arranged a telephone conversation between Inspector General of Police Lucky Kodituwakku and Udugampola to stop the embarrassing situation. Kodituwakku requested the SP to consider what the army intelligence man had to say. But the SP with alleged UNP connections instead phoned up Interior Minister John Ameratunga and complained there were pressures on him. To back Udugampola Ameratunga sent a senior officer of his ministry. Udugampola then arrested all men and took all weapons in to his custody. They were arrested on a charge of a plot to assassinate Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, now found to be baseless. After all the damage done and under growing protests of the army the UNF government released the arrested.

All this talk about a plot to kill Ranil Wickremesinghe was first published in the official organ of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, the Tamil Guardian during November of last year. It was complained to the army commander more or less the same time by the then UNP chairman Charitha Ratwatte and his deputy Daya Pelpola. Many consider it as a plant by the Tamil Tigers with the help of the UNP to destroy the LRRP unit of the army. Both the CID and the Army have found the assassination story baseless.

After details of the highly secretive unit was divulged to the police the Tamil Tigers killed the civil intelligence unit chief of the army in Batticaloa. The man, an ex-PLOTE member , Vidhyadharan was gunned down by LTTE assassins at Kottiyapula near Batticaloa on January 16. On January 21, the LTTE also kidnapped two more spies working for the same unit.

By January 4, the LTTE intelligence unit, apparently after receiving information from Police or political sources close to the Police had launched a crackdown on Tamil civilians suspected to have helped the LRRP teams in the Eastern province. The Sunday Times, a pro-government weekly in Colombo reported that an unknown number of civilians had been taken into custody for interrogation by LTTE intelligence cadres. Many of them could be dead by now.

The Lakbima newspaper quoted army commander Lt. General Lionel Balagalle of having said that the killing and the kidnapping took place because this meaningless police raid had exposed details of army intelligence. Lt.General Balagalle reportedly charged that because of a politically motivated police officer the patriotic and brave officers and their secret operations were unceremoniously exposed and now the army was finding it difficult to provide adequate security to army men thus exposed and their families.

Meanwhile, the Sunday Times, a pro-government weekly owned by Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe' S cousin, Ranjith Wijeyawardene said the arrest of the members of the LRRP unit has turned out to be illegal and all those who were arrested would soon file a fundamental rights case against the government. (EOM)

(27/01/02 Go2lanka.com)