Attention focused on security lapses at the scene of claymore attack on a bus in Sri Lanka

The special investigation team now in Kebithigollewa in the Anuradhapura district to investigate the claymore attack on a passenger bus has focused their attention towards possible negligence from the part of the home guards and Police who were manning the defense bunkers close to the crime scene.

Sources close to the investigation team said that there were two defense bunkers in close proximity to the scene of crime. It is believed that suspected Tamil Tiger rebels set off two claymores using remote control devices killing 16 passengers and injuring around 23 more.

A similar claymore attack killed 64 bus passengers a year ago and the security was enhanced in the area deploying hundreds more home guards to protect the villages and the roads.

Meanwhile the military has removed all permananet barriers that hamper the normal traffic flow on the roads in the capital Colombo following a Supreme Court ruling that some checkpoints violated the people’s right to free movement.

“Based on the court ruling, we started removing barriers that hamper normal traffic flow on the road, not the entire checkpoint,” military spokesman Brigadier Udaya Nanayakkara said. The Supreme Court ruling has put the government in a dilemma in providing security to the citizens.

“The government is now in a dilemma as it has to obey the law and at the same time protect civilians from bomb explosions in the city,” Media Minister Lakshman Yapa Abeywardane said yesterday at the Cabinet meeting.