Sri Lanka has begun repatriating the bodies of 84 Iranian sailors who were killed after their warship was torpedoed and sunk by a submarine from the United States Navy earlier this month in the Indian Ocean amid the ongoing Middle East conflict.
The decision followed an order from a court in Colombo directing the Sri Lankan government to hand over the remains to the Iranian embassy. Officials said all required domestic procedures had been completed and that Iran arranged a chartered aircraft to transport the bodies back to its territory.
The sailors were aboard the Iranian warship IRIS Dena, which sank on March 4 off the coast of Sri Lanka. The vessel reportedly carried around 180 crew members and was destroyed by a torpedo strike during the escalating conflict involving Iran and the United States. The incident marked the first time since the World War II that a US submarine had sunk an enemy warship using a torpedo.
According to officials, 32 sailors from the vessel were rescued by the Sri Lanka Navy, while about 60 others remain missing. The rescued sailors are currently staying in Sri Lanka and will not be repatriated immediately.
The bodies are being transported to Iran in multiple batches from Mattala Rajapaksa International Airport. The first batch of 46 bodies was flown out on Friday aboard an Iranian chartered cargo aircraft.
Although Sri Lanka has maintained a neutral position since the conflict began on February 28, the country was drawn into the situation when several Iranian naval vessels sought emergency docking permission at its ports during the hostilities.
Before Sri Lanka could decide whether to allow the vessels to dock, the IRIS Dena was attacked and sunk while returning to Iran after participating in naval exercises held in India the previous month.
A day after the sinking, Sri Lanka permitted another Iranian vessel, IRINS Bushehr, to dock at Trincomalee after the ship reported an engine malfunction. Around 208 crew members were disembarked at the port, and Sri Lanka granted them 30-day entry visas.
A third Iranian vessel, Lavan, which had also issued a distress signal, was provided safe harbour by India. The ship is currently docked in Kochi, where its crew of about 183 personnel—many of them young naval cadets—are being accommodated at nearby Indian naval facilities.
The sinking of the IRIS Dena near Sri Lanka has brought the conflict in the Middle East much closer to South Asia, raising concerns about the wider regional impact of the escalating confrontation.
