Indian Planes Drop Aid to Besieged Sri Lanka Tamils

Indian air force planes escorted by Mirage fighter jets parachuted relief supplies Thursday to Sri Lanka’s besieged Tamil minority, one day after this island nation’s navy drove off unarmed Indian fishing boats laden with food and medicine.

The Sri Lankan government called India’s airlift “a naked violation of our sovereignty . . . and territorial integrity.”

The Indian transport planes dropped supplies on the Jaffna Peninsula in northern Sri Lanka, a Tamil-dominated area where the Sri Lankan army began a major offensive against strongholds of Tamil separatist rebels 10 days ago.

“We have no military or other means of preventing this outrage,” the Sri Lankan government statement said. “We will take this up in an appropriate forum.”

A Foreign Ministry official, speaking anonymously, said: “There really was not much we could do about it, so we were hoping the sacks of salt would fall on the Tamil terrorists. Maybe next time they will be good enough to send coconuts.”

Sri Lankan President Junius R. Jayewardene had sent a message Thursday morning to Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi requesting a meeting to discuss how India’s aid could be received by Sri Lanka.

Instead of agreeing to a meeting, India sent five Soviet-built Antonov 32 transports and four Mirage 2000 escorts from Bangalore in southern India late Thursday to drop 25 tons of food and medicine on the Jaffna Peninsula.

India said it informed the Sri Lankan Embassy of the airlift two hours beforehand. India said the planes encountered no resistance.

Sri Lanka’s only air defenses are believed to be anti-aircraft guns dating from World War II. Its air force consists of Italian training craft that were converted to carry bombs after the Tamil war began, Chinese-built transport planes and Bell Ranger helicopters from the United States.

The small island of tea and spices formerly named Ceylon is no match for its huge northern neighbor across the Palk Strait, from which the Tamils arrived centuries ago. India has an army of more than a million men and an air force that includes advanced Soviet-built MIG-29s in addition to MIG-27s and French Mirages.

Tamils launched a guerrilla war four years ago in an effort to obtain a separate Tamil homeland in northern Sri Lanka, where most Tamils live. About 6,000 people have been killed since.