Sri Lankan navy arrests 27 Indian fishermen
Posted by Editor on December 24, 2012 - 4:37 pm
Sri Lankan Navy has arrested 27 Indian fishermen and seized their four trawlers after accusing them of fishing inside the country’s maritime area.
Navy spokesman Kosala Warnakulasuriya said that the Indians were arrested on Sunday night for “poaching inside Sri Lanka international maritime border limits (IMBL) off the eastern coast”.
The boats and the trawlers would be handed over to the police in the harbour town of Trincomalee later on Monday for further action, the Navy said.
Early this month, at least 40 Indian fishermen and their four trawlers were repatriated by the Navy after a similar arrest for straying into Sri Lanka’s IMBL.
Source: The Hindu
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This is a totally useless exercise by the SL Navy as all the Indian fishermen and their trawlers would be re-patriated with no penalties pronto. However, SL fishermen, if arrested and their boats impounded for poaching, they would be flung into a hell-hole of a prison in Tamil Nadu to be tormented for many months. Why is this injustice? Let SL also pay back in the same coin. Let Indian fishermen be also forced to pay heavy penalties, their trawlers, gear and fish be confiscated.
Indian fishermen are equipped with GPSN systems in their boats so they cannot go astray into SL waters. If they do, they have done so on purpose to fish the rich waters of SL. Our fishermen are too poor to own deep sea trawlers and GPSN systems. Hence they are likely to wander into Indian waters and face the terrible consequences.
I call on our MPs and Ministers to agitate the SL President to be firm with Indian fishermen and Indian Central Govt in order both sides may make a genuine effort to resolve the issue.
Could one solution be for joint fishing to share the catch equally with no boundaries but only quotas and laws to prevent over-fishing and catching only a certain size of fish to encourage growth of fish stocks?
Nicholas,
I agree with you. Any intruding Indian vessels should be summarily destroyed with our naval power. If the current Navy commander does not have the guts, we should recall retd Admiral Samarasinghe from Australia to continue with the excellent work he did during the elimination of the LTTE.
The Tamil Nadu state trained LTTE terrorists in numerous training camps in that state. Their politicians and the 80 million people are very hostile towards the people of Sri Lanka, even Sri Lanka Tamils. The TN state openly encourage TN fishermen to poach in Sri Lanka waters, to create another war to involve other countries. During the 40 year reign of terror by the LTTE, Tamil Nadu fishermen were used to smuggle arms to the LTTE. The Australian navy in collaboration with the Sri Lanka navy have a joint operation to stop illegal human smuggling rackets to carry LTTE Tamils to Australia and other countries. A joint fishing venture will create more problems to Sri Lanka, because of the hostile attitude of the people and politicians of Tamil Nadu.
Lakshman you are quite right. Joint fishing with India will not work due to Tamil Nadu rivalry and their crass exploitation attitude.
Gerard I have not said intruding Indian fishing vessels be destroyed. That would be an ‘Act of War’. We are not at war with India.
We spend much on patrolling our waters, against smuggling and fishing by India as well as other countries, such as Japan in their deep sea factory trawlers with large cold rooms and canning facilities. Hence the intruders who are arrested should be made to pay through our Courts. They escape each time due to the weakness of our President in this regard, when TN start screaming and Indian Foreign Minister starts hollering down the line to Hon MR. India knows SL President is a soft-touch in this regard and will roll-over like a pussy cat when they take a hardline. It is SL who should be taking a firm approach and give TN and India their come-uppance.