Kumaran Pathmanathan, once in-charge of international finance and arms smuggling operations of the LTTE, who had allegedly fled from Sri Lanka following the change of regime in Colombo, is still in the country.
“I am in Sri Lanka, contrary to news reports that I had fled from the country.I have no plans to leave the country.I will be thankful to God if the new government lets me continue my humanitarian work among the war-affected people,” Pathmanathan told Express over phone from his orphanage at Kilinochchi in North Sri Lanka on Sunday.
“Reporters should have checked with me before putting out the story of my flight,” he said.
President Maithripala Sirisena’s lieutenant and former Fisheries Minister Dr.Rajitha Senaratne, had told newspersons on Saturday, that Kumaran Pathmanathan better known as KP had flown out of the island from the Bandaranaike International Airport after it became clear that his guardian angel President Mahinda Rajapaksa was going to lose the January 8 Presidential election.
Asked if he is facing any problems from the new Maithripala Sirisena government, KP said: “I am not facing any problem. However, only time will tell what the new regime’s policy towards me will be.”
Asked whether he is facing any security issues after the change of guard in Colombo and the exit of Gotabaya Rajapaksa from the Defense Ministry, KP said there is no feeling of insecurity.
“There has been no lessening of security,” he said.
KP is guarded by Lankan army soldiers and moves around with army security.
KP in running a couple of orphanages for girls from war-affected families at Kilinochchi in North Sri Lanka.
He was abducted by Lankan military intelligence from Kuala Lumpur after the defeat of the LTTE in 2009 and bought to Colombo. In a deal with former Defense Secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa, KP was to leak information on the LTTE’s financial and arms smuggling rackets and in turn was to be allowed to salve his conscience by running an orphanage for war affected kids and doing developmental work with money from the Tamik Diaspora.
Asked what the Sirisena government hopes to do with KP, Sirisena’s campaign manager Mangala Samaraweera said on Sunday that his activities and the deal he had struck with the Rajapaksa government will be probed.
“We would like to know where LTTE’s money went,” Samaraweera said, The New Indian Express reports.
