COLOMBO, 25 April, 2021 (TON): Sri Lanka’s police arrested a top Muslim legislator on Saturday in connection with the 2019 Easter Sunday attacks because pressure was mounted to speed up the investigation. 
Detectives took Rishad Bathiudeen, leader of the All Ceylon Makkal Party (ACMP) and a former minister, into custody under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA), police spokesman Ajith Rohana said. 
Bathiudeen and his brother Riyaaj were arrested in pre-dawn raids on their homes in Colombo. 
“They were arrested under the PTA based on circumstantial and scientific evidence that they had connections with the suicide bombers who carried out the attacks,” Rohana said in a statement. 
According to a lawyer representing the brothers a presidential inquiry had found no evidence linking them to the bombers and the arrests were a political vendetta. 
“The arrests are politically motivated,” lawyer Rushdhie Habeeb said in a statement, which highlighted how the ACMP had opposed President Gotabaya Rajapaksa in 2019 elections. 
The arrests came three days after the head of Sri Lanka’s Roman Catholic Church, Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, accused the government of allowing investigations to stall. 

Nearly 200 people were arrested within days of the suicide attacks on hotels and churches by local Muslims.  

On April 21, 2019, an Easter Sunday, eight explosions targeted different locations in and outside Sri Lanka's capital Colombo, killing at least 250 people.