Another haul of heroin: This time on a fishing vessel from a port in Iran

SLN Suranimala, a Navy fast patrol vessel, had been shadowing a suspect fishing vessel in international waters off the South Wester n coast of Hikkaduwa last week. Onboard was a team of Special Task Force (STF) commandos, Police Narcotic Bureau (PNB) officers and Navy personnel prepared to board that boat.

At dusk, the vessel entered Sri Lankan territorial waters and changed course towards the Akurala-Telwatta coastline. The Suranimala moved in, trying to raise the vessel on the international maritime communication frequency. It had no response. The fishing vessel attempted to flee but could not outrun the Navy patrol vessel. The Suranimala instructed the crew to stop her engine and move towards the bow of the vessel as they came alongside. The team boarded. After detaining the nine- member crew, they found 107 kgs of heroin in four sacks hidden in the engine room. The find brought the total volume of heroin apprehended by Sri Lankan authorities in the first three months of this year to 840 kgs, already exceeding the total of 731 kgs taken in to custody in 2018. The haul has a street value of around Rs 1,200bn, police said.

The crew who were Iranians, including a suspected 17 yearold schoolboy who was on board, were remanded till April 5. The vessel had originated from the Konarak fishing port in Iran and had been at sea for 14 days, said SP Ruwan Gunasekara, police spokesman. Several mobile phones, a satellite phone and a GPS navigation system were found on board. The men had not been fishing although they were in a fishing boat. The Iranian embassy had provided an interpreter to assist the police with their inquiries.

The Iranians had no travel documents. They had dry rations and fresh water for another two weeks. The skipper had reportedly been approached by a drug trafficker to move the consignment, a PNB source told the Sunday Times, requesting anonymity. He suspects that the skipper convinced the other crew members ( fishermen from his village, including his brother) to make the journey to deliver the narcotics. They had been promised a handsome reward for a successful delivery. One of the suspects had claimed that, two days after they left Konarak, a smaller boat had towed a submerged package containing the heroin. Some of the heroin packets had become damp due to a poor watertight seal and had been laid out on the deck of the vessel to be dried before being repacked in the sacks and concealed in the engine room, a PNB source recounted.

The Interception was made possible through STF intelligence, the police spokesman said. There was not adequate information to surmise that part of the heroin had been thrown overboard, he said, the investigation was still in its early stages. The mobile phones, satellite phone and the GPS navigator are to be subjected to forensic analysis by order of the court. The vessel is to be taken to Trincomalee and kept in Navy custody. The support and training for countering drug and organised crime given by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) was appreciated by the Police and the Navy.

"The Beruwala-Dondra coast line is vulnerable," the PNB source pointed out, adding that the South- Western coast was dotted with a number of small unregulated fishing villages and had small vessels which can head beyond the territorial waters and rendezvous with a boat such as the Iranian one which was apprehended. "It only takes a few minutes to transfer a consignment from the larger vessel to dinghies," he said. The PNB has long been understaffed and poorly equipped, he complained, but said things were changing slowly. "We perform with bare- bones facilities, our vehicle fleet is small and outdated, some of them are easily identified by drug peddlers as 'police vehicles' from afar," he said. "I give full credit of our successes to our operatives on the ground. They are young and passionate." Modern equipment, tools and training are very important, the source asserted. There is only so far they can go on human effort alone. Recently, funding was allocated for some hi tech equipment to be procured to aid the counter-narcotics effort. "We are also seeing a lot of support from other Government stakeholders and from the general public these days," he said.