HC: Italians’ firing was act of terror

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The Kerala high court has taken a serious view of the Italian ship firing incident, terming it an act of terror. “Poor fishermen sleeping in their fishing boat were gunned down brutally even without issuing any warning to them,” the court noted on Friday.

Citing the First Information Report registered by the police, the court said as far as the deceased fishermen family and the natives of the country were concerned, the firing incident on February 15 last was an “act of terror.”

Justice P.S. Gopinathan made the oral observation during the course of arguments on the release of Enrica Lexie, the Italian vessel involved in the incident in the sea off Kollam coast.

The court asked the central government to file an affidavit on whether the captain of the ship should be arraigned as an accused in the case, and posted the petition filed by Dolphin Tankers, owners of Enrica Lexie seeking release the of vessel from Cochin port, to March 27.

When the case came up for hearing, the state and the Centre submitted their differences of opinion on the release of the vessel. While advocate-general K.P. Dandapani, on behalf of the state government, strongly opposed the release, assistant solicitor general P. Parameswaran Nair, representing the Centre, submitted that the Centre was having no objection vis-a-vis grant of clearance to the vessel to sail out.

“The Forensic Scientific Test as regards the weapons used in the firing will be completed within 10 days. If the report reveals any tampering of evidence regarding the weapons, further investigation will have to be conducted inside the vessel. So, the presence of the vessel in Kochi is essential.” the AG argued.

The petitioner argued that their vessel had been detained at the port for the last 38 days and they were suffering a huge loss.