COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — A Sri Lankan court has convicted 15 men for their alleged roles in organizing the 2019 Easter Sunday bombings that killed 267 people, sentencing each to at least 200 years in prison following a trial that lasted more than five years.

Another nine defendants were acquitted and released after the court ruled that the charges against them had not been proven. The verdict was delivered Tuesday under heavy security, with hundreds of police officers deployed around the courthouse.

The three-judge High Court panel also ordered the properties of the convicted men to be confiscated under Sri Lanka’s anti-terrorism laws. The defendants have the right to appeal the verdicts to the country’s Supreme Court.

The April 21, 2019 attacks targeted three churches and three luxury hotels during Easter services and celebrations. The bombings, which were inspired by the Islamic State group, were among the deadliest attacks in Sri Lanka’s history. At least 42 foreigners were among the 267 people killed, while another 574 people were wounded.

Authorities said none of the people believed to have directly carried out the bombings survived. In 2021, prosecutors filed 23,270 charges against 25 suspects accused of planning, supporting or inspiring the attacks. The charges included murder, conspiracy to commit terrorism, and offenses involving firearms and explosives under the Prevention of Terrorism Act.

One of the 25 defendants died before the trial was completed. All of the accused were members of Sri Lanka’s Muslim minority.

Prosecutors argued that the defendants were involved in a carefully organized operation intended to kill Christian worshippers and tourists. They told the court that investigators had obtained a video recorded the day before the bombings in which masked attackers pledged allegiance to then-Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and spoke of establishing an Islamic state in Sri Lanka.

Prosecutors also said one of the defendants had traveled to Syria and fought alongside the Islamic State group.

During the lengthy court proceedings, several defendants appeared relaxed, talking and laughing among themselves during breaks. They were also granted a prayer break while the judges read the verdict.

Seven defendants who did not have lawyers represented themselves during the sentencing proceedings. Mohamed Ibrahim Mohamed Naufer, an Islamic cleric whom prosecutors accused of influencing the attackers through radical preaching, declined to ask the court for leniency.

Naufer was sentenced to 220 years in prison with hard labor. Another defendant, Mohamed Ibrahim Saadiq Abdulla, was sentenced to 240 years with hard labor.

Of the other convicted defendants, five received 200-year sentences, four were sentenced to 220 years, three received 240 years and one was sentenced to 260 years, with the length of each sentence based on their alleged involvement in conspiring to organize or assisting with the attacks.

The bombings deeply shocked Sri Lanka and revived memories of the country’s decades-long conflict with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, commonly known as the Tamil Tigers, which had carried out bombings in public places during its campaign for a separate state for Sri Lanka’s ethnic Tamil minority.

The attacks also led to allegations of a broader conspiracy involving Sri Lankan intelligence officials. The Defense Ministry denied involvement, but a parliamentary committee concluded that police and intelligence agencies had failed to act on repeated warnings about a possible attack.

In February, police arrested Suresh Salley, a former intelligence chief and retired army major general, over allegations that he had prior knowledge of the attacks and conspired to carry them out.

In July, a former police chief and a former senior Defense Ministry official were sentenced to death for failing to respond adequately to foreign intelligence warnings about possible attacks. Sri Lanka has not carried out an execution since 1976, meaning death sentences generally result in imprisonment for life.

Sri Lanka’s Catholic Church welcomed the latest verdict. The church has previously alleged, without providing evidence, that those identified as perpetrators were not the masterminds behind the bombings and that a larger conspiracy was involved.

Two of the three churches targeted in the attacks were Catholic churches, while the third was Protestant. A majority of those killed were Catholic worshippers.

Rev. Jude Chrishantha Fernando, a spokesperson for the Archdiocese of Colombo, said outside the courthouse that the church was satisfied with the sentences and believed they could help prevent similar attacks in the future.

However, Fernando also said the suicide bombers were not acting in isolation and suggested they had been used as part of a broader effort to gain political power.

Another priest, Rev. Dilan Perera, described the verdict as a setback for religious fundamentalism and emphasized the importance of Sri Lanka’s multicultural and multireligious society.

The convictions mark a major judicial development in the long-running effort to hold those accused of supporting the Easter bombings accountable, while questions about whether a wider conspiracy existed remain part of the country’s continuing debate over the attacks.

SOURCE: Associated Press (AP), Krishan Francis, updated September 24, 2026.