Vessel That Carried Tamils Identified

The 155 Sri Lankan refugees rescued off the coast of Newfoundland began their voyage in West Germany aboard a German-owned ship, police said today.

The Sri Lankan Tamils departed from the harbor of Brake, 20 miles northwest of Bremen, on July 28 on the Aurigae, a Honduran-registered ship with a German owner, Hamburg Police Chief Dieter Heering told a news conference.

Two Tamils arrested Thursday in Hamburg have confessed to involvement in smuggling out the refugees for $2,500 apiece, Heering said.

Heering confirmed earlier reports that the Tamils picked up off Newfoundland on Monday were from refugee camps in West Germany rather than from India, as the refugees maintained.

Looking for Captain

Heering said authorities are looking for the Aurigae and its captain, Wolfgang Bindel, who police say is also the vessel’s owner. The police chief said the Tamils paid the 45-year-old Bindel a total of $350,000 for the operation.

Heering said the Tamils had been brought to the port of Brake from different parts of West Germany by bus.

In Canada, Inspector Jack Lavers of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police said that he accepted the Hamburg police report and that it cleared up many questions surrounding the refugees.

The Sri Lankans were flown at government expense to Montreal and Toronto on Thursday and have one-year residence and work permits while their applications for permanent refugee status are reviewed.

The revelations from Hamburg will not affect their cases unless they had become permanent residents of West Germany. Deportation to Sri Lanka is ruled out as long as the strife there, now in its third year, continues.