TMVP-linked operatives collaborate with SL Navy, suppress Tamil fishers in Vaakarai

[TamilNet, Monday, 03 August 2020, 21:05 GMT]
Violating the condition of operating purse-seine boats beyond 10 miles from the coast, the SL Navy is allowing former Tamil paramilitary operatives to poach in the seas along with intruding poachers from outside the district, fisher society representatives complain. The SLNS Kashyapa, the SL Navy detachment in Vaakarai of Batticaloa district, is demanding 20 rupees per kilo of the catch as an unofficial “tax” from the poachers, they said on condition on anonymity. The ex-paramilitary operatives of the TMVP group were exerting political pressure on local Tamil fisher societies the same way as by the EPDP in the North, they said.

The SL Navy has allowed Sinhala and Muslim purse seiners to engage in the illegal fishing (churukku-valai) in the prohibited zone is using the TMVP to hijack the fisher societies in Vaakarai.

The SL Navy-backed poaching is destroying the fishing ecosystem as well as seriously threatening the livelihood of more than one thousand Tamil fisher families in Vaakarai.

The representatives of the fisher societies say that TMVP-linked men were operating seine boats of their own making money as well as suppressing local mobilisation against the poaching.

Chronology: