The suicide bomber who made an abortive attempt to assassinate a cabinet minister of the ruling United People's Freedom Alliance (UPFA) early this month was assisted by a group of government employees to prepare forged identity cards, a court inquiry has revealed.

A court investigating the incident has been told that certain government officials of the National Identity Card office (Registrar of Persons) were involved in preparing the forged documents after accepting a bribe from the suicide bomber and her accomplice.

The suicide bomber exploded herself at a police station after being detected before she reached her target while the accomplice was arrested at Minister Douglas Devananda's office whom the bomber was targeting.

The court was told by the Criminal Investigations Department official that all documents related to the illegal transaction of preparing the forged identity card had been removed from the department.

Four employees of the identity card office have been arrested in connection with the forgery which helped the suicide bomber to freely move in Colombo and enter the minister's office without any suspicion.

The issue about preparation of the forged national identity cards has sparked off a fresh security concern amidst fears that similar identity cards are being misused, the CID told courts.

Investigators said that the suicide bomber and her accomplice prepared the forged identity cards for Rs. 3,500 ($ 34) per card and they had made use of genuine printing paper to print these cards.

CID believes that the four people arrested in connection with preparing the forged identity cards would have prepared other identity cards for suspected Tamil guerrillas as they have been recognised as the main contact persons who supplied forged identity cards.

The department's printing section is placed under high security and entry is restricted to a limited number of persons while strict check is maintained on the printing paper issued to the printing staff, but in the cases of these two persons they had got their identities by using a genuine application which failed to pass through the proper channels.