Sri Lankans detained after 57-hour deadlock

It took the Malaysia police nearly three days to arrest 75 Sri Lankan asylum seekers from a trawler anchored near the marine police base jetty in Batu Uban here as negotiations for them to surrender broke down.

 

The police finally moved to detain the Sri Lankans at 11.30am yesterday after the 57-hour stand-off.

 

The operation went smoothly as none of the immigrants were hurt, Penang police chief Deputy Comm Datuk Wira Ayub Yaakob said, adding that police had to move in after several rounds of negotiations broke down.

 

“We tried to coax them into surrendering but they refused.

 

“Even officials from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees were called to verify their status before we took any action. We did not move in earlier as some of the immigrants had threatened to take their own lives.

 

“We even provided them food, water and medicine,” he told a press conference at the marine base here yesterday.

 

DCP Ayub said a marine police craft on patrol rounds first intercepted the trawler off Kuala Tanjung Piandang in Kerian, Perak, about 3am on Friday.

 

During an inspection, they found only the Sri Lankans on board, comprising 61 men, six women and eight children.

 

They were staying in cramped conditions.

 

DCP Ayub said there were at least five leaks on the boat and the propeller was damaged.

 

“We then decided to tow the boat back to the marine police base for fear the boat might sink,” he said.

 

After reaching the base 16 hours later on the same day, the immigrants refused to dissembark from the trawler.

 

DCP Ayub said the Sri Lankans made several requests which could not be met, including a guarantee that they could safely enter Australia,Canada or New Zealand for asylum.

 

“We were also tracing the masterminds. The Sri Lankans were actually on board a Malaysian-registered fishing traw­ler,” he said.