Velanai residents want SLN's electric fence removed

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 08 July 2003, 18:42 GMT]
Residents of Thuraiyoor area in the Velanai division in the Jaffna district Tuesday made an urgent appeal to the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam to take immediate steps to pressure the Sri Lanka Navy to remove its live electric fence bordering the Iyanar Vidiyalayam, civil groups said.

The urgent appeal followed an incident Tuesday, in which a ten-year-old Grade 5 student of Iyanar Vidiyalayam, Antony Ajanthan, was electrocuted when he accidentally touched the electric fence. However, he was fortunate and his life was saved when he was taken to the Jaffna teaching hospital in time, medical sources said.

The residents of Thuraiyoor recalled that on July 22, 1999, an adult, K.Sivayogalingam, was fatally electrocuted when he accidentally touched the electric fence of the Thuraiyoor navy camp bordering the school, sources said

Tuesday’s incident has made the residents of the village to represent the matter to the SLMM and the LTTE in Jaffna to exert pressure on the authorities to remove the electric fence immediately, sources said.

The residents said they would launch an agitation campaign if the authorities failed to take prompt action to remove the live electric fence from the school boundary line.