Ask Lanka to remove underwater mines: Vaiko to Manmohan

MDMK leader Vaiko, known for his pro-LTTE stance, on Friday urged Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to ask the Sri Lankan Government to remove the underwater defence system set up across the Palk Straits. “It is shocking that the Sri Lankan Government is setting up an underwater defence system between Katchateevu and Neduntheevu (falling within Lankan territorial waters) in which they have placed mines which would damage and destroy the boats of Indian fishermen,” Vaiko said in his letter to the Prime Minister. “Lanka’s high-handed action is a naked aggression into the domain of our sovereign rights in International waters,” Vaiko said.

He was reacting to reports about the Indian Navy warning Tamil Nadu fishermen against crossing the IMBL into Lankan territorial waters for fishing, claiming to have received a communiqué from the Lankan Navy about laying a defence warning system in the sea. Both the navies have been taking into custody fishermen violating the boundary line. Fishermen associations in Rameshwaram have threatened to launch an indefinite stop-work agitation to demand the release of 12 fishermen and “to stop the harassment” against them.