The Maldivian President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom has telephoned Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to thank for Indian naval aircraft’s quick response in providing reconnaissance for the country’s Coast Guard to help engage the high jacked Indian fishing trawler “Sri Krishna” and sink it with an alleged load of LTTE guns and rocket launchers.
The Indian response for help to pursue the hijacked boat by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) has been described by the Maldivian government as “quick and swift.”
India’s Tribune newspaper publishing an agency item quoted Maldivian Foreign Minister Ahamed Shaheed as saying, ““We asked for the Indian government's assistance,” and, “the response was swift.”
The Maldivian government used its coast guard ship “Huravee” to engage the allegedly gun running hijacked “Sri Krishna” trawler that attempted twice to leave the territorial waters of the Maldives. The renamed “Huravee” is a former Indian coast guard ship given to the Maldives and its former name was INS Tillanchang. The transfer took place last year when Indian Defense Minister visited Maldives .
Now it has been revealed four of Sri Krishan’s occupants were killed when it was engaged by Huravee and five survived including the kidnapped Kerala based Malayali boat mechanic Simon Soza, whom the alleged LTTE gunrunners took with them in their long illegal sojourn.
The Indian Trawler “Sri Krishna” was missing from the last known position of the South East of the Pamban island and is believed to have been hijacked by the Sea Tigers with its crew of 12 , 11 fishermen from Tamil Nadu and one mechanic from Kerala, named Simon Soza.
“Tamil-speaking persons” who hijacked Sri Krishna first threw out its fishing equipment and later brought in arms including AK-47s and RPG launchers. Soza, who is from is a Malayalam speaking person from Kerala, had reportedly told the Maldivian authorities that he was kept on board because he was the trawler’s mechanic, someone very essential in the long journey undertaken by the pirates of the Sea Tigers. He was one of the first to jump from the boat to the sea when the boat was being pursued and rescued by the Coastguard ship.
A team of investigators from the Sri Lanka navy also has traveled to the capital Male where the alleged LTTE Sea Tigers are in custody to investigate what actually the boat was doing in the Maldivian waters.
In the sting operations conducted by the FBI undercover agents in the United States it had been revealed that the LTTE was planning to ship its arms shipments to the Indian Ocean and from there to smuggle them to Sri Lanka in smaller vessels.
During the regime of Ranil Wickremesinghe , when a lie low policy was advised to the Sri Lanka Navy larger ships came closer to the LTTE dominated shores to unload cargos of armaments and explosives. Thereafter the LTTE has been increasingly engaging fishing craft re-loaded from other ships in mid seas to smuggle in arms.
Source: Lanka Web
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