MV 'Captain Ali' intercepted and brought to Colombo

The controversial ship MV ‘Captain Ali’ carrying unauthorized cargo collected by LTTE sympathizers in Europe supposedly to be distributed to the Internally Displaced Civilians in Wanni has been intercepted by Sri Lanka Navy’s Naval Patrol 160 KM West of Colombo at around 0400hrs this morning (4th June). The vessel sailing under the Syrian flag had a crew of fifteen (15) including one(01) Iceland national, one (01) UK passport holder of Sri Lankan Tamil origin, two(02) Egyptian nationals and eleven (11) Syrian nationals. The Captain is a Syrian national. The vessel is 93m in length and 14m in breath and is now being brought down to Colombo for further investigations.

The Government of Sri Lanka had previously warned that such unsolicited ‘humanitarian’ assistance or illegal intrusions into its territorial waters will not be tolerated. It was also stated that the GOSL will not hesitate to exercise her right to protect her territorial waters from external sources and the Sri Lanka Navy was also kept under high alert.

‘Mercy Mission to Wanni’ a fund raising campaign sponsored by ‘Act Now’, a pro LTTE organization, was carried out in the United Kingdom last year to collect funds and supply ‘claiming’ to be distributed among the Internally Displaced Tamil civilians who were being kept as a human shield of fire by the LTTE in the, then rebel held Wanni in the north of Sri Lanka. Funds collected from gullible EU citizens and sometimes forcibly taken from the Tamil Diaspora were utilized to acquire the supplies. The supplies thus collected were planned to be shipped to Sri Lanka under the guise of ‘Humanitarian Aid’ using LTTE’s logistics network.

The whole campaign was monitored by Kristjan Guomundsson the Iceland national who was onboard MV ‘Captain Ali’ at the time of its seizure by the Sri Lankan Navy. Incidentally Kristjan was an ex-SLMM (Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission) Naval Monitor turned LTTE sympathizer who was the head of SLMM’s Liason Office in Kilinochchi and later in its Jaffna office. The SLMM came under severe criticism for being biased towards the LTTE before it wrapped up operations in Sri Lanka lately.

Originally ‘Vanangaman,’ a suspected LTTE run vessel, set sail on 20th April 2009 from Ipswich, UK carrying the Mercy Mission’s cargo but changed strategy due to obvious reasons. The ‘Vanangaman’ changed course and set sail to France where it offloaded its cargo at Fecamp. The cargo was then transported over land to the French port of Fos-Sur-Mer, where it was loaded onto MV ‘Captain Ali’ with another load of supplies. The second leg of the ‘Mercy Mission’ began on the 7th May, from the said port in France with MV’Captain Ali’ carrying a cargo of 884 MT. When contacted by Sri Lanka Naval authorities the owners of the ship said that they were unaware of the ship’s use by a Terrorist Organization, its front offices and by LTTE terrorist sympathizers in Britain and France.

MV’Captain Ali’ was sighted by many ships using the International Sea way and has been under surveillance from the moment it set sail. The Sri Lanka Navy had maintained a close watch over the development of events and had a steady flow of information on the movement of the ‘Rogue Vessel’ from various reliable sources and was ready to intercept the controversial vessel if it tries to enter Sri Lankan waters.

The vessel remains under Sri Lanka Navy’s supervision and the owners were being contacted and informed duely.

MV Captain Ali	MV Captain Ali at anchor