Mohamed Ibrahim Mohamed Naufer, also known as Naufar Moulavi, the first accused in the Easter Sunday terror attacks case, has rejected all charges against him and presented his defence before the Colombo Trial-at-Bar.
The case, involving 25 accused persons and 23,270 charges including conspiracy, aiding and abetting the Easter Sunday attacks, was taken up before a three-judge bench comprising Judges Navaratna Marasinghe, Ramanathan Kannan and Sujeewa Nissanka.
The prosecution concluded presenting its evidence last week, following which the accused began delivering their defence statements from the dock on Monday.
He said 940 charges had been filed against him in relation to the allegations and rejected all of them.
The first accused also challenged the validity of a confession allegedly recorded by the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) following his arrest. He claimed the statement was not made voluntarily and alleged that he was assaulted while in CID custody.
Naufar Moulavi further denied having any involvement in the Easter Sunday attacks or any conspiracy connected to them.
During his defence, Naufar Moulavi also made allegations concerning activities attributed to Zahran Hashim’s National Thowheed Jamaath (NTJ) organisation prior to the Easter Sunday attacks.
He claimed that incidents targeting the Muslim community had occurred in 2015 and 2016 and alleged that authorities had failed to take action against those responsible.
Concluding his statement, Naufar Moulavi requested that the court acquit him and release him from all charges.
Meanwhile, the 20th to 25th accused persons also presented their defence statements from the dock on Monday.
The court was informed that the 18th accused in the case is deceased.
