Sri Lankan community assists flood-affected people of Japan

The Sri Lankan community based in the Prefecture of Ibaraki, along with the officials of the Embassy of Sri Lanka in Japan, extended assistance to the flood affected people by providing food and other necessities.

The recent unprecedented floods in the Prefectures of Ibaraki, Miyagi and Tochigi were devastating and a large number of houses and properties were destroyed.  Further, over three million people were evacuated at the time of the devastating floods and transportation too has been markedly disrupted.   

The Sri Lankan community domiciled in the Prefecture of Ibaraki, along with the officials of the Embassy, provided rice and curry and other necessities to the victims and displaced persons at several Relief Centers.

The Sri Lankan community provided food to well over a thousand such affected persons at the Relief Centres in the Prefecture of Ibaraki. A significant number of Sri Lankans do live and work in the Prefecture of Ibaraki.

Charge d’ Affaires and the Ambassador-designate to the Kingdom of Bahrain, Dr. A. Saj U. Mendis, stated that the Sri Lankan community strongly felt that it was literally a duty to assist the affected persons in the said Prefectures. In this context, Anil Priyantha Gamaethige, a resident of Ibaraki for an extended length of time, and Sunil Gamage, Honorary Consul General of Sri Lanka to Ibaraki, who is currently in Sri Lanka, organised, coordinated and orchestrated the assistance extended to the affected persons, along with the Embassy and other Sri Lankans domiciled in the region.

When key media personnel of Japan asked the reasons for the Sri Lankan community and the Embassy to extend assistance to the affected people, Dr. Mendis impressed the fact that Japan is a very close ally of Sri Lanka and Japan has extended assistance, cooperation, accommodation and facilitation to Sri Lanka for over six decades, both at good times and at testing times. He further added that this assistance, extended to the affected people of the flood affected Prefectures, was only a modest and unassuming gesture of goodwill, solidarity, unity and benevolence.  

According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan, Sri Lanka was one of the first countries to extend assistance to the flood affected persons of the three Prefectures in Japan and was grateful of the gesture.