Two persons who made “white van” allegations detained for questioning

The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) today decided to detain the two individuals who had made controversial statements regarding “white vans” during a media briefing led by former Health Minister Rajitha Senaratne.

The two suspects will accordingly be detained for 72 hours for further interrogation.

It was also reported that they are to be produced before courts on coming Monday (16).

These two suspects were arrested by the CID last night (13) at Mahara area.

The CID had commenced an investigation into a media briefing conducted by the former Health Minister in early November along with two other individuals, where they made controversial statements.

On the 10th of November this year, Senaratne had called two persons named Anthony Douglas Fernando and Athula Sanjeewa Madanayake for the said press conference, who made controversial statements and allegations regarding “white vans” and purported incidents of certain abductions, assassinations, robberies and forced disappearances during the administration of former President Mahinda Rajapaksa.

One of them had claimed that he was a “white van” driver involved in abducting people while the other claimed he once served as a driver to transport a stock of gold in previously LTTE-held areas.

On December 02, the CID presented submission to the Colombo Chief Magistrate Lanka Jayaratne regarding the said media briefing. Considering a request made by the CID, the chief magistrate had ordered several media institutions to submit the unedited video footage from this press conference to the investigators for onward probes.

The investigations in this regard were launched after a complaint was lodged by an individual named Kumudu Pradeep Sanjeewa Perera.