Pakistan Army completes mission in Hambantota
 

from Asanga Warnakulasuriya in Hambantota

Pakistan High Commissioner Bashir Wali Mohmand yesterday stressed that the time tested friendship between the two countries will continue to prosper since Pakistan and Sri Lanka have always been well respected "friends in need and friends indeed".

"Pakistan and Sri Lanka have always maintained an excellent friendship and the Pakistani Government is willing to extend their fullest support to Sri Lanka to make headway out of this devastation," the High Commissioner said.

The High Commissioner made these observations during a tour of Hambantota to inspect the groundwork completed by Pakistan Army in rebuilding tsunami affected locations.

A stretch of 29km from Hambantota-Migahajandura, a friendship road, was cleared by Pakistani troops and was handed over to public yesterday.

The Sri Lankan Government has always been there when the Pakistani Government needed support and we try our best to reciprocate at this needy hour, Bashir Mohmand said.

The work completed by motivated and dedicated troops who worked seven days a week for months is self-explanatory of our friendship.

Najmul, officer in charge of Pakistani Army Operations in Sri Lanka commended the work of the Pakistan Army Tsunami Relief Operation in Sri Lanka (PATROS) said "well done" especially when working in a different situation.

Pakistan troops acting swiftly following the tsunami cleared over 80,000 sqm of thick jungle and another 800 cubic metres of debris within 48 hours. PATROS commenced their deployment on January 11 with 170 troops including doctors, engineers and Pakistan Navy ships and C-130 aircraft.

Among the few rehabilitation projects completed by PATROS was setting up a state of the art water purifying plant capable of pumping 1,000 gallons of water per day.

PATROS also undertook the arduous task of cleaning the salterns in Hambantota area which were polluted by rubble. The troops had to manually dig debris from 566,740 sq meters belonging to Lanka Salt since the use of machinery was virtually impossible with the highly concentrated residual brine, an engineer said.

Pakistani troops had also renovated a kindergarten school at Prabodha, St. Mary's College and Zahira College in Hambantota. A team of Pakistani doctors joined hands with the Base Hospital staff in Hambantota and are supporting larger number of patients daily.