Jaffna food stock enough to last only four weeks - GA

[TamilNet, Saturday, 23 September 2006, 10:48 GMT]
Government Agent (GA) in Jaffna, K. Ganesh, on Friday denied the reports from Colombo that the food stock for 3 months had reached Jaffna. Clarifying that 5,100 metric tonnes of supplies were needed for a month in Jaffna, Mr. K. Ganesh said Jaffna had recently received 6,399 metric tonnes in three cargo ships, and the remaining supplies were barely adequate for another 4 weeks.

A consignment of 1875 metric tonnes of supplies, shipped from Trincomalee to Point Pedro by the 'CITY OF LIVERPOOL' vessel, were being unloaded at Point Pedro Port.

Postal bags from out stations were brought in this ship and taken to Jaffna post office, for the first time, since the postal service from the mainland was terminated from August 11 with the closure of A-9 road to Jaffna.

Two other ships, MERCS II and HIND-M, had unloaded consignments at the Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) harbour in Kankesanturai (KKS), cargo weighing 3624 and 900 metric tons of food items respectively, sources at Jaffna District Secretariat said.

The land routes to Jaffna peninsula being shut on August 11th due to the outbreak of clashes in the north, 'MERCS RUHUHU' ship was the first to carry food items escorted by the International Committee of Red Cross (ICRC) to the Pt. Pedro harbour. However, when the ICRC withdrew its services, KKS harbour which is under the control of Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) was preferred by the SLN citing security reasons.

'CITY OF LIVERPOOL' is the first to deliver cargo at Pt. Pedro harbour since Kankesanturai harbour was used to deliver consignments of food by sea route.

The ships had transported food items like rice, sugar and wheat flour to the Jaffna peninsula.