Murder of Joseph Pararajasingham MP and Journalist on December 24, 2005

October 13, 2024
56 Littles Road
Scarborough, ON
M1B 5C5, Canada.
 

Hon. Anura Kumara Dissanayake,
President
Presidential Secretariat
Colombo 1, Sri Lanka.
 

Murder of Joseph Pararajasingham MP and Journalist on December 24, 2005 

Dear Mr. President,

I am glad you have ordered the re-opening of cases of murdered/disappeared journalists and human rights activists during Mahinda Rajapaksa’s rule. Two of them, Lalith Kumar Weeraraj and Kugan Murugananthan, disappeared in December 2011 in Jaffna.  

Justice was not meted out to the kith and kin of the deceased persons.  No proper and impartial inquiries were held to bring the suspects before the courts. The previous rulers consistently failed to hold perpetrators of serious crimes accountable. The case files were closed for political reasons.

One of the victims was Joseph Pararajasingham MP was shot dead while attending mass at St Mary’s Church, Batticaloa on Christmas Day 24, 2005. One of the five persons suspected of criminal responsibility for the murder was Sivanesathurai Chandrakanthan (alias Pillayan), the leader of Tamil Makkal Viduthalai Pulikal (TMVP), a strong supporter of the ruling political party.

The CID arrested the former LTTE leader Pillayan on October 11, 2015, when he arrived at the CID office in Colombo to give a statement over the killing of former Batticaloa district Tamil National Alliance parliamentarian Joseph Pararajasingham.

Pillayan was released on bail by the Batticaloa High Court Judge T. Wigneswaran (no relation to CV Wigneswaran) on 24 November last year. On January 13, 2021, the same High Court ordered the dismissal of the case filed against Pillayan. Also, four others, including former Eastern Provincial Councillors Edwin and Pradeep Master, who were remanded on suspicion of the murder, were also ordered to be released.

When the murder case was heard in the High Court, the Senior State Counsel appearing for the Attorney General informed the court that there is no need to file evidence in the case and proceed further. The Senior State Counsel told the court that the confessional statements obtained from the accused were under duress.

It was a well-known fact Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa took a personal interest in the Court case and tried to use his influence with the previous government for Pillayan release. It was MR who appointed Pillayan as Chief Minister of Eastern Provincial Council in 2008 when his party had only 4 members in a Council consisting of 37 members.

Pillayan along with Karuna Amman broke away from the LTTE in March 2004 and joined the government/army. Their cadres fought against the LTTE along with the Sri Lankan army. Karuna Amman was alleged to have killed 500 policemen who surrendered to the LTTE in June 1990. Last year during the heat of an election campaign and in an act of bravado he told his supporters that he killed over 2,000 Sinhalese soldiers in a single day. And he is capable of performing a repeat performance even now. He was referring to his role in the capture of the strategic Elephant Pass camp on April 22, 2000.

David Griffiths, Director of the Office of the Secretary-General at Amnesty International said “The collapse of this case marks yet another sorry milestone in the Sri Lankan authorities’ continued failure to ensure justice for crimes committed during the armed conflict. The Attorney General’s Office has not indicated any interest in re-opening the investigation into the murder.

It is only in Sri Lanka the judiciary dances to the music of the ruling party. Remember Justice Mohan Peiris dropping a bombshell telling Maithripala Sirisena, within a day of assuming office as President that he be appointed as the Chief Justice. If appointed, he told a startled President that he would write judgments how he wanted! President told others the Justice visited him three consecutive days! That is the sordid calibre of not ordinary judges but judges of the Supreme Court.

Yours sincerely

Veluppillai Thangavelu