India to send food to Jaffna

The Government has sought India’s help to rush urgent supplies of food, medicine and other essential consumer items to the Jaffna peninsula where food shortages have led to a humanitarian crisis.

The appeal was made by Minister Rohita Bogollagama to India’s Deputy High Commissioner A. Manikkam on Friday.

A spokesperson for the Indian High Commission told The Sunday Times New Delhi was considering an outright grant of all essential needs.

The modalities of how these items will be transported from Indian ports to the Jaffna peninsula were now being worked out, the spokesperson said.

The request amounts to 20,000 metric tons. They are to be distributed equally between the Northern and Eastern provinces.

Earlier, the Government of India had lifted a local ban on exports of dhal and sugar. It had wanted to allow the Government to import them but shipping arrangements became an issue and the offer was not availed of.

According to diplomatic sources, New Delhi is likely to make its own arrangements to ship the supplies to Jaffna.

Jaffna’s Government Agent K. Ganesh on Friday declared that the peninsula was facing a severe food crisis. This was the result of stocks not being replenished.

The Government Agent said in a statement that for September and October, he had requested for 25,104 metric tons of food items for the peninsula, but had received only 19,358 metric tons until the end of October. He said he was forced to limit the distribution to the Multi-Purpose Co-operative Societies.

For November he has requested from the government 24,481 metric tons of food items and warned that if this stock was not sent, the crisis would be aggravated. The government’s main problem in sending supplies to the Jaffna peninsula is the difficulty in chartering private ships following the closure of the A 9 highway at Muhamalai on August 11.

LTTE spokesman Daya Master told The Sunday Times yesterday the rebels would not encourage any other route to send supplies to the peninsula, other than the A 9 road. ‘Without opening the A 9 nothing will move forward regarding the peace talks,” he said.

In a related development, two UN officials are due in Colombo to discuss assistance to transport food and essential items to the Jaffna peninsula, Disaster Management and Human Rights Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe told The Sunday Times.

“They are coming on our invitation and will discuss ways of helping the government to transport food,” he said.

However, the UN earlier responding to a government request said that though it was willing to assist, it needed a security guarantee from the LTTE as well.

UN spokesperson Orla Clinton declined to comment about the impending visit of the UN officials.

The government this week in a fresh effort to overcome the food crisis in Jaffna provided the facility for individuals to send the food items by parcel post to Jaffna.

But, the move has created serious difficulties to the postal department. They are not equipped to carry food. At least 33,000 bags had been received in Jaffna, but nearly half of them had been badly damaged.

“The postal bags provided are not suitable to carry extra weight. Therefore when most of parcels arrive in Jaffna they are damaged. We have been forced to buy bags and repack the food items before dispatching them to the people,” Jaffna Chief Post Master K. Sivaraja told The Sunday Times.