House Ban on Laptops to Thwart LTTE Infiltration

FEARING THE LTTE would use someone to smuggle in an explosive device to Parliament to carry out an assassination, the government has prohibited all members from bringing in electronic equipment into the House.

The Parliament security has been instructed to strictly impose the latest security measure. In a recent letter to members, the Speaker said they could use the cyber café located in the library on the ground floor as the ban on laptops and similar equipment would be in force until the improvement of the security situation.

Authoritative sources said the LTTE had the expertise to turn out a high tech bomb to target an individual.

Referring to the August 1987 JVP hand grenade attack on the UNP parliamentary group in Parliament which killed Matara District MP Keerthi Abeywickrema, the sources said the LTTE would explore ways and means of striking at the SLFP-led ruling coalition.

The sources said the stepped-up military pressure on LTTE's Vanni bases would prompt attacks on politicians.

It would be part of their strategy to off-set battlefield losses and trigger chaos in the South, the sources said, asserting the attacks could be directed at disrupting the forthcoming SAARC summit.

Two army divisions and two task forces are on the offensive across the Vanni and Weli Oya regions where the LTTE is trying desperately to halt the army.

Tightening of security at Parliament came to light hard on the heels of the alleged assassination attempt on Prime Minister Ratnasiri Wickremanayake at a recent function at the BMICH.

The sources said the recent arrest of former head of the Tamil Section of the National Film Corporation Kanagasabai Devadasan alias Nadan revealed the LTTE infiltration of the JVP. He is alleged to have planned an assassination attempt on the Prime Minister.

The sources said investigators would try to establish the time Devadasan had joined the LTTE. What we really liked to know is whether he joined the LTTE willingly or was forced to carry out clandestine activities.

Well informed sources said this was a clear case of the LTTE infiltrating a political party. The person who had asked the then Cultural Affairs Minister Vijitha Herath to accommodate Devadasan on the NFC, too, would be an LTTE contact, the sources said.

Nadan had taken over the Tamil Section on March 25, 2004 until he quit on March 8, 2006. He had also contested election to the Western Provincial Council on the NSSP ticket in 1998 and Jaffna on the United Socialist Party ticket in 2001.