US Navy Held Sri Lankan Refugees Who Escaped From Camps In Tamil Nadu

About 59 refugees had gone missing in the first week of September. Police inquiries had revealed that the refugees had gone to Kerala after a gang promised them to take them to Canada. 

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Chennai: The US navy on Friday caught 85 Sri Lankan Tamils who were found in a stranded ferry near the island of Diego Garcia on Maldives’ territorial waters. The ferry also had 59 Sri Lankan refugees who were suspected to have escaped from refugee camps in Trichy and Madurai. 

According to a report in the Times of India, the Sri Lankans were travelling to South Africa from Kerala to reach Canada to seek asylum. Police sources said that they were travelling on an illegal ferry and it got stranded due to turbulence and bad weather in the Indian Ocean between Maldives and Mauritius 

The report said, the US navy at the island of Diego Garcia, an overseas territory of the United Kingdom, approached the ferry after it entered into the waters that were controlled by it and after inquiry, they were handed over to the Maldives government. 

Explaining that the complete identity of those rescued from the ferry was still to be ascertained and many of them did not even have valid passports, the report, quoting officials, said the Maldives government has informed both the Tamil Nadu and Sri Lankan governments about their illegal journey. ‘Q’ branch officials from Tamil Nadu police had started investigating the issue. 

Quoting police sources, the report said that of 65,000 Sri Lankan refugees staying at 108 camps in Tamil Nadu, 59 refugees had gone missing in the first week of September. Police inquiries had revealed that the refugees had gone to Kerala and bought a ferry for Rs 50 lakh after a gang promised them to take them to Canada.