Sri Lanka Paying Deadly Price For Political Infighting: Analysts

Crucial intelligence that could have prevented Sri Lanka's Easter attacks went ignored in part because of feuding between the country's leaders, experts say

Colombo, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 25th Apr, 2019 ) :Crucial intelligence that could have prevented Sri Lanka's Easter attacks went ignored in part because of feuding between the country's leaders, experts say.

The government has admitted "major" lapses in its failure to act on intelligence warnings, and analysts say a longstanding political crisis is to blame.

The warnings were clear: On April 11, Sri Lanka's police chief issued an alert saying that radical Islamist group National Thowheeth Jama'ath (NTJ) planned suicide bombings of "prominent churches", citing alerts from a foreign intelligence agency.

The document was addressed to several top officials, but neither the prime minister nor the deputy defence minister were among the recipients.

That comes as little surprise to experts familiar with Sri Lanka's messy political scene, which has been dominated by wrangling between Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe and President Maithripala Sirisena.

Sirisena also serves as defence and law and order minister.

"As part of his ongoing war with the prime minister, the president has tried to weaken him in many ways, including taking the police under his control," said Alan Keenan, Sri Lanka specialist at the International Crisis Group think tank.

"So it's entirely possible that the police wouldn't share information with ministers not aligned with the president," Keenan told AFP.