India’s warships to remain with Lanka....by Shamindra Ferdinando
SLNS Sayurala, one of the Indian warships in service with the SLN
Sri Lanka is confident that there is no basis for recent Indian press reports that the government of India wants two warships which it had leased to Sri Lanka in 2007 on annually renewable contract returned.
Navy spokesman Captain Athula Senarath told The Island yesterday that as far as the navy was concerned, they had not been asked to return the ships. Responding to our queries, Senarath, who recently succeeded Captain D. K. P. Dassanayake as the navy spokesman said that one of the ships, SLNS Sagara, would undergo a major refit in Calcutta.
It would take almost a year, he said, adding that the Commanding Officer of the ship and its crew, too, were in Calcutta.
According to him, the navy had taken delivery of the ships from the Indian Coast Guard following an agreement between the governments of Sri Lanka and India.
Speaking on the condition of anonymity, a high ranking navy official told The Island that Sri Lanka was eternally grateful to the government of India for leasing out two warships on friendly terms.
The navy commissioned ICGS Varaha and ICGS Vigraha as SLNS Sagara and SLNS Sayurala, respectively. The navy spokesman said that Sri Lanka had acquired an Indian warship some time ago. It was subsequently commissioned as SLNS Sayura.
The Indian ships, along with two Fast Missile Vessels (FMVs), SLNS Suranimala and SLNS Nandimithra and SLNS Samudura destroyed eight LTTE floating arsenals on the high seas in four separate confrontations over a two-year-period. The Indian vessels were involved in the four operations. The hunting down of enemy warehouses in international waters is considered the navy’s greatest achievement in the entire Eelam war. Sri Lanka acquired FMVs from Israel while SLNS Samudura formerly belonged to the US Coast Guard.
The navy spokesman said that the navy had to maintain its precious OPV (Offshore Patrol Vessels) fleet though the LTTE no longer posed a conventional military threat to Sri Lanka. He dismissed the assertion that Sri Lanka could lower her guard now that the LTTE had been defeated. According to him, the deployment of vessels, along with a modern network of radars and electronic sensors was necessary to thwart any attempt to revive the LTTE.
After the recent commissioning of ICGS Vigraha as SLNS Sayurala in Trincomalee, Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa said that the navy had to ensure that the LTTE would not be able to use sea routes again to bring in men and material. He went to the extent of warning that the LTTE could train cadres abroad and move them in boats.
Defence sources said that effective patrolling by Sri Lanka would be beneficial even to India and the two countries could explore ways and means of further enhancing cooperation between their navies.
Sources said that Indo-Lanka naval exercises would be an essential element in the whole process.
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