Secretary Defence Visiting Jaffna Hails Multifaceted Roles of Tri Services, Police & Health Officials in the Peninsula

Aimed at appreciating the role of armed forces and sharing New Year sentiments with hundreds of tri service, Special Task Force personnel and Policemen, engaged in COVID-19 control tasks in the Jaffna peninsula, Major General (Retired) Kamal Gunaratne, Secretary to the Ministry of Defence flew to Jaffna on Friday (17) and addressed the troops and Policemen who are performing commendable humanitarian services, irrespective of risks for their own lives

During his address to the gathering, he offered his best wishes and also the greetings of HE the President on the traditional Sinhala and Hindu New Year and spelt out the challenges that have been posed to the prevention campaign.

“Your dedicated contribution in most risky districts, like in Jaffna or elsewhere in Colombo, Gampaha and Kalutara districts assisted Health authorities enormously. Many of those infected victims have had so many contacts at different levels and they had probably transmitted the virus without their own knowledge. Likewise, our forces and Policemen had to operate in multifaceted ways since many of those individuals were trying their best to hide information about the whereabouts and places they visited. Our dedicated troops and Policemen had to toil very much day and night to exactly confirm their 2nd, 3rd, 4th circles of contacts, etc even monitoring or tracking their mobile phones and all other modes of communication. All those minute and relevant information were traced by you, our intelligence forces and policemen who joined hands with Health authorities,” he pointed out.

Urging them to continue their great work and assistance to all Jaffna-based civil authorities to maintain essential services of the people, he also did not fail to pay a special tribute to medical officers, nurses, para medical staff, Public Health Inspectors, Grama Seva officials and all stakeholders working for the benefit of Jaffna people in this high risk area for COVID-19.

Air Marshal Sumangala Dias, Commander of the Sri Lanka Air Force, Major General Ruwan Wanigasooriya, Commander, Security Forces - Jaffna, DIG, Jaffna, Senior Navy, Air Force, STF and Police officers, Tri service Senior Officers, Police Officers and servicemen were there to listen to the visiting Secretary Defence.

Source: www.army.lk