Gotabhaya speaks about Kosgama Blast

Gotabhaya speaks about Kosgama Blast

Former Secretary of Defence Mr. Gotabhaya Rajapaksa making a statement to today's "Divaina" newspaper has mentioned that the Army Commander should be entirely responsible for the blast at Kosgama Army ammunition depot and that if he was still the Secretary of Defence he would not hesitate to sack this Army Commander

immediately. He further said that instead of throwing the burden of the responsibility of managing such a location of significance on transferring that responsibility and mistake on higher-ups or those below, he should accept all that and resign.

He added the following too: "The Panagoda Army Camp ammunition depot which was there during the tenure of the former President Chandrika Bandaranaike Cumaratunga was transferred to Kosgama Salawa Camp. When I became the Secretary of Defence, since I felt that this place was not suitable and was not a safe location I despatched a part of the heavy artillery there to Diyatalawa and Maduru Oya. At the same time I issued orders to the Army Commander to strengthen the security of the Kosgama Army ammunition depot.

Even during the time of the war and even after that there was about 25,000 tons of ammunition in this ammunition depot. After the war, a large stock of that ammunition was taken to the Veyangoda ammunition depot. As it was in a populated environment, I decided to install 2 Army ammunition depots in Anuradhapura, Oyamaduwa and Rambewa, Palagaswewa areas. Both those locations were former farmlands of the Livestock Development Board.

The regime that came after that and the Army Commander did not take steps to install those depots. If it was done, the Veyangoda and Kosgama depots would have been closed by now. Because I removed and lessened the stock of ammunition of 25,000 tons at Kosgama when I was the Secretary of Defence, this present damage there happened to be comparatively less from the explosion. If not, the damage would have been excessive".

Sirimevan Kasthuriaarachchi (Divaina)