The Attorney General (AG) on Thursday (22 June) gave an undertaking to the court that former AG Dappula de Liver will not be arrested over his controversial statements on the 2019 Easter Sunday terror attacks. 

Accordingly, Additional Solicitor General Parinda Ranasinghe, on behalf of AG Sanjaya Rajaratnam, today assured the court that the former AG will not be arrested regarding a statement he had previously made on the 2019 attacks, when a petition filed by the former AG Livera was taken up before the court this morning (June 22). 

De Livera was summoned before the Terrorist Investigation Division (TID) on numerous occasions, in order to record a statement on his controversial statement pertaining to an alleged coup behind the Easter Sunday attacks. 

The former AG filed a petition on 24 April, highlighting that the police are not authorized to question his actions during his tenure as the AG, adding that such treatment violated his privileges as an Attorney General. 

Thus, he sought an order through the petition, preventing the TID from arresting and recording statements from him. 

On 18 May, then-Attorney General Dappula de Livera claimed that there had been a conspiracy behind the series of bomb attacks that took place on 21 April 2019, killing 269 persons and injuring over 500 others. 

Livera infamously handled the Easter Sunday inquiry right from the beginning while he served as the Solicitor General before being appointed as Attorney General on 29 April 2019, just eight days after the Easter Sunday attacks. 

He later retired on 25 May 2021, while acting AG Sanjaya Rajaratnam was appointed as his successor.