Boat used to ferry Sri Lankan refugees seized

An abandoned mechanized boat, believed to have been used by people smugglers to illegally ferry Sri Lankan refugees to Australia, was reportedly seized by Indian police off the Muttom Coast in Kanyakumari District on Saturday, the New Indian Express reported.

The boat was seized after the police had rounded up a few Sri Lankan refugees who had paid for the passage and had returned recently after encountering coastal patrol boats blocking their route, police sources said. The boat, said to be around 75 feet in length, had been stranded at Old Harbour in Muttom. It had been registered in Kerala but had been painted over by the smugglers with a fake registration number.

The police had learned that nine refugees from the Vellore Melmonavoor Refugee Camp had been missing since June 19. The nine persons returned on June 23, and were questioned by Q Branch sleuths. During the course of their interrogation, it was learned that one of the four men arrested by the department recently in Pollachi, along with a few other “agents,” had received money from the nine refugees and had promised to ferry them to Australia, the report claimed.