Police arrest Myanmar nationals in Mannar

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 14 July 2004, 15:58 GMT]
Sri Lanka Police produced in the Mannar courts Wednesday two Myanmar nationals who had escaped from a detention centre for foreigners near Colombo. The two men were arrested while loitering in the shrub around the long abandoned Thalaimannar railway station on Tuesday morning.

Two men from Tharapuram, a Muslim village east of Thalaimannar, were arrested by the Police for assisting the Myanmar nationals. Police said the Myanmar men had come to Thalaimannar to travel by boat clandestinely to India from where they had planned to go overland to Myanmar.

Mannar judge N.M.M Abdullah directed the Police to produce the two Myanmarese at the Gangodawila courts on 16 July as their case was not within his jurisdiction.

He ordered that Mr. Ahmad Marzook and Mr. Abdul Latif Barakathullah be remanded until 27 July.