Global concern over maritime security cripples LTTE

Heightened global and regional cooperation to increase maritime security is adversely affecting the fighting capabilities of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) on sea and land, military experts say.

"In naval terms, detection is more difficult than destruction and therefore, there is growing international cooperation for detection through arrangements like the Maritime Domain Awareness (MDA) programme in the Asia-Pacific region," a military official told IANS on condition of anonymity.

He pointed out that the Indian Navy was holding an MDA conference at Port Blair in the Andamans in which 12 navies, including the Sri Lankan Navy, were participating. The Sri Lankans had sent naval cutter Suranimala under a commodore for the meeting.

He added that the Andamans were ideal for holding such a conference because, at its eastern most end, it was only 63 nautical miles from western Indonesia, an area that had become notorious for arms smuggling and piracy.

And significantly, the floating warehouses of the LTTE, which the Sri Lankan Navy had destroyed in the past year, were generally anchored just west of Java in Indonesia.

Read more,
http://mangalorean.com/news.php?newstype=local&newsid=64647