Navy had no hand in Raviraj killing

By Kavindya Chris Thomas - From Ceylon Today

Former Commander of the Sri Lanka Navy, Admiral Wasantha Karannagoda said, the LTTE was strengthening the Sampur area, so that they could take control of the Trincomalee Harbour, which was of strategic importance to Sri Lanka. "If the Navy in Trincomalee was neutralized, then Jaffna would have fallen. Fortunately, realizing this situation, then President Chandrika Kumaratunga dissolved the UNP Government that was in power, which had a ceasefire agreement with the LTTE. This prevented a disastrous situation," he added.

Q : Tell us about yourself.
A: I was born in 1952. I have three brothers and a sister. My father, who is no more, was a civil servant and my mother is a housewife. I am married. My wife's name is Ashoka.

Q : How was your school life? Were you active in sports?
A: I studied at Ananda College. I was very active in sports during my school days. I represented the school swim team and the water polo team for many years and captained both teams in 1970. In addition, I was the Scout Troupe Leader of Ananda during the period 1968 to 1970 and the first Queen's Scout of Ananda College. I did athletics too. I was the school champion in athletics in under 12 category. I was also the house athletic captain at Ananda. Furthermore, I was a junior and senior prefect of the College.

Q : What were your initial experiences in the Navy?
A: I joined the Navy after completing the Advanced Level. I thought I could avoid studies after joining the Navy. But, on the contrary, we had to do more studies in the Navy. That included advance level subjects and naval subjects. The initial training period in the Navy was five years during our time. Once the initial training was completed, I had to proceed abroad for further training at different levels which are required, as you rise in the ranks in the Navy.

As a part of these training, I did a Master's Degree in Defence and Strategic Studies. I also entered the Colombo University and did a Master's in Business Administration in 1994. When the LTTE was defeated comprehensively in May 2009, I was awarded an honorary PhD by the University of Kelaniya.
In addition to academic studies, sea training was also included in our training programme. If you are not used to rough seas, you tend to get seasick. Initially I got seasick very badly. I thought to myself, what a mistake I did by joining the Navy because it was unbearable when you get seasick. I was on a Chinese gunboat one day and the sea was very rough. We were going from Colombo to Trincomalee. When we were passing the Dondra Head lighthouse, the distance from land to our ship was about five nautical miles. I felt like jumping overboard and swimming ashore. It was that bad.

Q : Can you recall some of the unforgettable incidents in your career?
A: I served on many ships and shore establishments operating and located in the North and the East during the 25 years of the war against the LTTE. I had a very serious experience on 30 October 1986. I was serving as the third senior officer in SLN's Elara camp which was located in the Karaitivu Island in the Jaffna Peninsula. The Naval Officer in charge of the Northern Naval Command was also stationed at Elara base. In addition to the Area Commander, the Commanding Officer of the Elara base and the second in Command of the Base, who was myself, were also stationed there. Among the three of us, always two had to stay in the camp due to the prevailing security situation. There were LTTE cadres in the Karaitivu Island and the entire Kytes Island was controlled by the LTTE, which was across the lagoon, 800 metres away.

The LTTE was not that advanced at that time. Some of them were wearing sarongs and did not even have slippers to wear. They used to fire 60mm mortars at the camp and we were quite used to it. Whenever a mortar is fired it makes a 'pop' sound. This sound is enough for us to know of the incoming mortar and gives us time to find cover. Initially we used to react to these provocations. But when we realized that the LTTE was trying to wear us down, we did not engage them, but observed their movements.

On this particular day the Northern Commander was away on leave and only the Commanding Officer of the base and I were present. Suddenly the Commanding Officer was also asked to come to Colombo to attend a seminar and I was left to take command of the camp with 15 officers and 300-400 sailors.

That night some naval personnel were to proceed on leave by ship to Trincomalee. So they were getting ready to go in a wallam out to sea, where in the sea they will get into a bigger vessel. As I was the only senior officer I decided to go to the piers to supervise the movement. There were two piers and they are located in the lagoon which separates Kytes Island from Karaitivu Island. We have illuminated the water around pier areas with lights and always kept sentries with grenades since there were intelligence reports of a possible attack by underwater saboteurs from the Kytes Island. The only way to detect them was the air bubbles on the water surface. So whenever the sentries observe any suspicious activities they were ordered to throw grenades. No one can survive an underwater bomb explosion.

So the wallam were about to leave the pier when one of the sentries from the other pier shouted saying not to send out the boats as there are 'Navy divers' in the water. I immediately knew this is LTTE underwater saboteurs, as I had not cleared any Navy diver to get into water in the night. It was around one in the morning. I immediately replied saying that those weren't our divers and ordered them to throw grenades. The sentries and others who were there also opened fire along with me, when the saboteurs started popping their heads out of the water due to grenade explosions in the water. That night we killed three LTTE divers.

Q : What were your experiences during the final years of the war?
A: Before the fourth Eelam war, in 2003, there were some events that took place that should be mentioned. Under the cover of the ceasefire, the LTTE was stocking up ammunition, building up their cadre strength. Unfortunately we weren't allowed to counter this build up. They were strengthening the Sampur area so that they could take control of the Trincomalee Harbour which was of strategic importance to us. If the Navy in Trincomalee was neutralized, then Jaffna would have fallen. Everything, from cargo to manpower, was transported to Jaffna from Trincomalee by sea. If the harbour was blocked, the forces in the North would have to leave Jaffna Peninsula, due to non-availability of supplies. We did not have enough aircraft to undertake the whole operation. Fortunately, realizing this situation, then President Chandrika Kumaratunga dissolved the UNP Government that was in power which had a ceasefire agreement with the LTTE. This prevented a disastrous situation.

In 2005, when I became Commander, I knew that it is vital to stop the inflow of arms and ammunition to the LTTE. We had received information about LTTE's floating warehouses where they had all their stocks of warlike material stored. These ships stay mid seas thousands of kilometres away from Sri Lanka and came closer to Sri Lanka up to about 400 km, whenever the requirement arose, to unload small quantities of arms and ammunition into fishing trawlers. They mingled with our fishing fleet and brought those stocks ashore. In 2006 we captured and destroyed 11 of these fishing trawlers.

We graphically plotted the firing patterns of the LTTE heavy weapons. Data regarding the amount of artillery and mortars that was fired by the two parties were always recorded and reported back to the Joint Operations Headquarters (JOH). JOH compiles this information and sent it to the three Services as information. Therefore we were checking with the destruction of 11 trawlers whether there was a reduction in the firing patterns of LTTE heavy weapons. But, it was not so. Then I realized in order to stop this completely, we had to address the 'cause' instead of 'symptoms'. So together with the assistance of the State Intelligence Services (SIS) and the Army Intelligence I was able to build up the Naval Intelligence to a higher level. This unit, which was already there, was small and I was able to develop it. By 2008, we had naval intelligence operatives working undercover as labourers in boat building yards and tea makers in boutiques and doing other odd jobs mainly in the Negombo area, Colombo North and in other areas of the country. If the terrorists were making any sort of plans, we always got the information beforehand. We also got information from captured LTTE cadres through interrogation.

We started looking for these floating warehouses. We got the Army's assistance in 2006 and early part of 2007, in locating the first three ships and destroyed them.
But, after the destruction of the third ship, we did not receive any intelligence from the Army as the then Army Commander had prevented such information from being shared. Therefore, we had to develop other methods to get information on the remaining LTTE ships. We started working closely with the US Embassy in Sri Lanka, and in September 2007 we got the assistance of the United States to locate the last four ships of the LTTE. They were destroyed in September and October 2007.

We destroyed eight floating warehouses and with that we destroyed the entire stock of the LTTE arms and ammunition stockpiled over many years. This was a very crucial point in the war. The Army took 14 months according to the Army Commander to capture Madhu, due to LTTE heavy weapons firing. But, when the LTTE 'floating warehouses' were destroyed, it all changed, and the Army started moving very fast. Every month they were capturing and liberating areas. Casualties were reduced drastically. The Navy action helped Army to reduce their casualties drastically and therefore to move faster against the LTTE on the ground.

Q : There were some recent allegations against you and the Navy for the kidnappings and the assassinations of prominent figures in the country conducted through a special investigative unit of the Navy. What is your comment?
A: I or the Navy was not involved in this incident. It was one naval officer who was in charge of my security detail who was involved. As soon as I came to know about this incident, I reported the matter to the DIG of the CID in 2009 and requested to conduct an investigation.

The newspaper articles regarding these allegations were incorrect. Those who were arrested were Navy personnel. But they were operating with the police on legitimate intelligence work for counter LTTE operations in Colombo at that time. These personnel had been attached to the police even before my appointment as the Navy Commander in September 2005. But subsequently in 2007, I withdrew them from the police.

Q : Recently, three suspects attached to the Navy were arrested for the assassination of TNA Parliamentarian Nadarajah Raviraj. Do you consider this as a legitimate intelligence operation work?
A: I don't know whether it was a legitimate operation or not. You will have to ask the police. The inquiries are going on. I presume the truth will come out. There was no such unit in the Navy. As they were Navy personnel, many in the country think that these operations were conducted by the Navy. The Navy had nothing to do with this incident.

Q : Wasn't this special investigation unit located on the Chaithya Road, Colombo, near the Navy Headquarters?
A: Chaithya Road did not have any building associated with such a unit.

Q : How was Sampath Munasinghe aka Navy Sampath and Commander D.K.P. Dassanayake involved in this unit?
A: Sampath Munasinghe was my security officer and Commander Dassanayake had nothing to do with this. It is I, who reported about Sampath Munasinghe to the DIG CID.

Q : How is your relationship with Sarath Fonseka now?
A: I do not have anything to do with him.