Fisherman shot dead

[TamilNet, Monday, 02 March 1998, 23:59 GMT]
The Sri Lankan Navy shot dead a fisherman from Katkovalam near Pt. Pedro in Jaffna yesterday. He was identified as Aarumugam Lavan, 21. He was shot dead while he was out at sea.

Fishermen on the Vadamaradchi coast were banned from putting out to sea after the Sea Tiger attack on the SLN convoy on February 22. The ban was lifted on February 26.

However, fisherman from Supparmadam and Inparutty near Pt. Pedro were told they could not go to sea until the SL Navy had salvaged its vessels which were sunk by the Sea Tigers.

The first attack on the SLN convoy by the Sea Tigers on February 22, according to witnesses, was in the high seas off Inparutty. Several hundred fishermen in Chulipuram, meanwhile, have protested to Members of Parliament in Jaffna and government officials that fishing should be permitted in the seas off Jaffna's northwest coast.

They have demanded that the authorities should return to them their fishing nets, rafts and other fishing gear which have been confiscated from them.

But military officials said that the chances of the ban on fishing in the seas off the Chulipuram and Maathagal coast being lifted are slim, particularly in the aftermath of the Sea Tiger attack on the SLN on February 22.

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