Sirisena was Sri Lanka's President and Defence Minister at the time of the attacks when nine suicide bombers belonging to the local Islamist extremist group National Thawheed Jamaat (NTJ) linked to ISIS carried out a series of devastating blasts that tore through three Catholic churches and three luxury hotels on April 21, 2019, killing nearly 270 people, including 11 Indians, and injuring over 500.
