Army soldiers converted to Muslim planning an attack similar to Easter Attacks ?
Several news websites reported a news article with a headline “45 army soldiers to convert for Islam religion and planning to launch an attack similar to Easter Sunday Attacks”. This news was later shared by several social media users both in Facebook and Twitter. According to the websites, a person called Risham Maroosh (President of […]
Several news websites reported a news article with a headline “45 army soldiers to convert for Islam religion and planning to launch an attack similar to Easter Sunday Attacks”. This news was later shared by several social media users both in Facebook and Twitter.
According to the websites, a person called Risham Maroosh (President of an organization called the Public Service Organization - මහජන සේවා සංවිධානය නම් සංවිධානයක සභාපති රිශාම් මරූෂ් ) has expressed these views during a press conference on 16th September at Dambulla. He said he has informed above information to Army intelligence and Prime Minister, and since they have not taken any steps, he reveled the information through a press conference.
A Facebook user shared the above story as below.
| Facebook Link | Archived Link |
A Twitter user shared the same news.
| Twitter Link | Archived Link |
Gossiplanka news and Mawbima news websites also had published the news.
| Web Link | Archived Link |
| News Web Link | Archived Link |
Another facebook user has shared the post.
| Facebook Link | Archived Link |
Fact Check
To investigate the truth behind these claims we inspected the official statement Sri Lanka Army had issued in this regard. Given below is the statement by Sri Lanka Army’s official Facebook page regarding these claims.
| Facebook Link | Archived Link |
Sri Lanka Army in the above statement has denied the story in totality. Statement goes on to say that the news is totally fabricated to damage the reputation of Sri Lanka Army and create distress among public. Furthermore, Sri Lanka Army request from public, not to be alarmed over such baseless news published by various groups with different interests and motives and requested media institutions to refrain from giving publicity to these claims.
Extracts from media release from defence.lk website is as follows.
“It is firmly stated that this news is totally fabricated and published with malice to tarnish the image of the Sri Lanka Army. Further, it could create an unnecessary fear among the pubic disturbing their daily routine. Investigations to identify the persons connected to this incident are now being conducted by the Sri Lanka Army and the Criminal Investigation Department.”
| Defence.lk Web Link | Archived Link |
In order to get first-hand information about this story we contacted Sri Lanka Army Media Division and were informed that these claims were totally baseless and targeted towards tarnishing the image of SL Army. Further we were informed that the person who had made these claims was being questioned by CID (Criminal Investigation Division) and SL Army is not going to allow any personnel to make such allegations and investigations are being carried out against the said army personnel as well.
Conclusion:
From our investigation, it is evident the claim that “Army soldiers converted to Islam in order to plan and launch an attack similar to Easter Sunday attack” is totally false. Sri Lanka Army firmly stated in a media release that this news is totally fabricated and published with malice to tarnish the image of the Sri Lanka Army and to create unnecessary fear among the pubic disturbing their daily routine. Investigations to identify the personnel connected to this incident are now being conducted by the Sri Lanka Army and the Criminal Investigation Department.
Title:Army soldiers converted to Muslim planning an attack similar to Easter Attacks ?
Fact Check By: Sathyajith SubasingheResult: False
