President Mahinda Rajapaksa today instructed the release of all Indian fishermen in Sri Lankan custody, as a goodwill measure on the occasion of Indian Prime Minister-designate Narendra Modi’s swearing in.
Modi has invited all leaders of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (Saarc) nations, including Rajapaksa and Pakistan’s Nawaz Sharif for the swearing-in ceremony to be held in New Delhi on Monday— the first time that foreign leaders have been invited for an occasion of this kind.
Similarly in March Rajapaksa had ordered the release of Indian fishermen detained for poaching as a “goodwill gesture” after New Delhi abstained in a vote on a U.N. resolution that approved an international inquiry on Sri Lanka.
India, Sri Lanka’s largest trade partner, backed two prior resolutions, but unexpectedly took a neutral stand on the demand for a probe into actions by both Sri Lankan state forces and Tamil rebels during the 26-year conflict that ended in 2009.
Sri Lanka says poaching and illegal fishing by Indian fishermen depletes the catches of its own fishermen.
The arrests have caused friction with India’s southern state of Tamil Nadu and become a regional issue in campaigning for an Indian general election that starts on April 7.
