India and Sri Lanka are boosting efforts to stop the Liberation Tigers smuggling supplies from India's Tamil Nadu state across the Palk Straits, the government in Colombo said this week.
The authorities in Tamil Nadu are creating new coastal checkpoints and police posts and two days ago seized aluminum bars being smuggled to northern Sri Lanka as raw material for weapons, Sri Lanka’s Defense spokesman, Minister Keheliya Rambukwella, said.
The Indian moves are in response to renewed requests by the government of hardline President Mahinda Rajapakse which has vowed to destroy the LTTE militarily.
The Sri Lankan request came as Indian Defence Minister A.K.Anthony pledged to make surveillance of India’s coast topmost priority of the coast guard and navy.
It also comes after a string of seizures of materials which could be used for weapons manufacture by the Indian authorities in coastal areas of the southern state of Tamil Nadu, home to 65 million Tamils.
Minister Rambukwella, citing the recent visit to India in early February by Sri Lankan Defence Secretary Gothabaya Rajapakse, brother of the President, has described the relations between the two countries as ‘a new beginning.’
Hailing the intercepting of a boat loaded with arm making material in the Palk Stait by Indian Coast Guards on February 14, he said: “Please, I request India to do more.”
Minister Anthony, taking part in a fleet review on February 19, described the suspected LTTE boat traffic in the Palk Strait as a threat.
Citing this as an example, he promised 15 new ships, 23 aircraft and modern equipment for the Indian Coast Guard to combat drug trafficking, piracy and smuggling along the extensive Indian coast.
The Sri Lankan government has long been lobbying New Delhi for naval cooperation to crackdown on alleged LTTE gun running in the Indian Ocean.
President Rajapakse during his visit to India in November 2006 personally sought joint patrolling of the common waters.
However Indian premier Manmohan Singh denied this request from Sri Lanka’s Sinhala hardline government amid opposition from major political parties from Tamil Nadu.
Earlier this month Sri Lanka’s new foreign minister Rohita Bogollogama visited India to repeat his predecessor, Mangala Samraweera’s, request for increased patrolling of the waters between the two countries.
The recent captures of boats carrying supplies for the LTTE suggest that, whilst not publicly agreeing to Sri Lanka’s request, India has stepped up naval patrolling as requested.
The seizures began in early November last year with the Tamil Nadu police recovering a lathe machine used for making bomb shells from a fishing boat in Rameswaram.
Shortly afterwards, on November 29, Tamil Nadu police recovered 30 boxes of Gelex boosters used to increase the velocity of bomb shrapnel from a vehicle involved in a traffic accident near Madhurai on the highway connecting Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu.
On December 5 and 11 fishermen from Rameswaram found three live rockets in their fishing nets and handed them in to the authorities.
Again, on January 24 Tamil Nadu police took into custody two tons of ball bearings used in bombs and mines on route from Chennai to the coastal city of Thoothukudi.
Following this haul eight people were arrested including five Sri Lankan Tamils and further three tons of ball bearings were seized.
The arrested men have been charged with trading in illegal explosives and for violating the Foreigners’ Act, press reports said.
“Several seizures of contraband along the Tamil Nadu coast as also from inland have stamps of the LTTE,” a senior police officer told Indian media after the raid.
“But in the absence of mid sea-sea seizures or landing-point seizures in Sri Lanka we have not been able to link the Tigers with the smuggling,” he added.
Indian intelligence agency sources believe that the recent hauls may be only the tip of the iceberg.
With over 1000km of coastline and over 400 landing points the long and porous Tamil Nadu coast is considered an ideal route for taking supplies to Sri Lanka’s north.
The authorities in Tamil Nadu are creating new coastal checkpoints and police posts and two days ago seized aluminum bars being smuggled to northern Sri Lanka as raw material for weapons, Sri Lanka’s Defense spokesman, Minister Keheliya Rambukwella, said.
The Indian moves are in response to renewed requests by the government of hardline President Mahinda Rajapakse which has vowed to destroy the LTTE militarily.
The Sri Lankan request came as Indian Defence Minister A.K.Anthony pledged to make surveillance of India’s coast topmost priority of the coast guard and navy.
It also comes after a string of seizures of materials which could be used for weapons manufacture by the Indian authorities in coastal areas of the southern state of Tamil Nadu, home to 65 million Tamils.
Minister Rambukwella, citing the recent visit to India in early February by Sri Lankan Defence Secretary Gothabaya Rajapakse, brother of the President, has described the relations between the two countries as ‘a new beginning.’
Hailing the intercepting of a boat loaded with arm making material in the Palk Stait by Indian Coast Guards on February 14, he said: “Please, I request India to do more.”
Minister Anthony, taking part in a fleet review on February 19, described the suspected LTTE boat traffic in the Palk Strait as a threat.
Citing this as an example, he promised 15 new ships, 23 aircraft and modern equipment for the Indian Coast Guard to combat drug trafficking, piracy and smuggling along the extensive Indian coast.
The Sri Lankan government has long been lobbying New Delhi for naval cooperation to crackdown on alleged LTTE gun running in the Indian Ocean.
President Rajapakse during his visit to India in November 2006 personally sought joint patrolling of the common waters.
However Indian premier Manmohan Singh denied this request from Sri Lanka’s Sinhala hardline government amid opposition from major political parties from Tamil Nadu.
Earlier this month Sri Lanka’s new foreign minister Rohita Bogollogama visited India to repeat his predecessor, Mangala Samraweera’s, request for increased patrolling of the waters between the two countries.
The recent captures of boats carrying supplies for the LTTE suggest that, whilst not publicly agreeing to Sri Lanka’s request, India has stepped up naval patrolling as requested.
The seizures began in early November last year with the Tamil Nadu police recovering a lathe machine used for making bomb shells from a fishing boat in Rameswaram.
Shortly afterwards, on November 29, Tamil Nadu police recovered 30 boxes of Gelex boosters used to increase the velocity of bomb shrapnel from a vehicle involved in a traffic accident near Madhurai on the highway connecting Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu.
On December 5 and 11 fishermen from Rameswaram found three live rockets in their fishing nets and handed them in to the authorities.
Again, on January 24 Tamil Nadu police took into custody two tons of ball bearings used in bombs and mines on route from Chennai to the coastal city of Thoothukudi.
Following this haul eight people were arrested including five Sri Lankan Tamils and further three tons of ball bearings were seized.
The arrested men have been charged with trading in illegal explosives and for violating the Foreigners’ Act, press reports said.
“Several seizures of contraband along the Tamil Nadu coast as also from inland have stamps of the LTTE,” a senior police officer told Indian media after the raid.
“But in the absence of mid sea-sea seizures or landing-point seizures in Sri Lanka we have not been able to link the Tigers with the smuggling,” he added.
Indian intelligence agency sources believe that the recent hauls may be only the tip of the iceberg.
With over 1000km of coastline and over 400 landing points the long and porous Tamil Nadu coast is considered an ideal route for taking supplies to Sri Lanka’s north.
