SL Navy orders Trinco residents to hoist white flags

[TamilNet, Sunday, 08 January 2006, 18:51 GMT]
Several Tamil residents of Trincomalee and its suburbs Sunday complained to civil right leaders and parliamentarians that soldiers of the Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) manning checkpoints in the eastern port town are harassing them to hoist white flags to observe mourning for the SNL personnel who died in the Dvora gunboat blast, sources said.

More soldiers have been deployed in the town following the explosion of the SLN gunboat in Trincomalee harbor in the early morning of Saturday.

Meanwhile, the Commanding Officer of the Dvora gunboat sunk in Trincomalee Sea following an explosion has been identified as Lieutenant Commander Kamal Wanaretne. Two rescued sailors are now warded in the Trincomalee naval hospital, SLN sources said.

The destroyed Dvora gunboat was one of the six, " Shaldag Dvoras" in the possession of the SLN and one of the two Dvora gunboats were on regular patrol mission in the eastern sea, naval sources said.