The Sri Lankan government is negotiating with the employer of a group of retired Sri Lankan soldiers who have been deprived of their salary for nearly a year and a half, as they languish in a village in Iraq.

The group of 41 ex-Sri Lankan soldiers are said to have found employment through a rogue job agency that had provided them with vacancies as security guards for a Jordanian company involved in construction projects in Al-Amra, nearly 700km from the Iraqi capital, Baghdad.

It is learnt that the Sri Lankan Embassy in Lebanon have been negotiating with their employer in order to ensure the company pays the 41 Sri Lankan soldiers by the end of April as their salary has been in arrears for nearly 17 months.

An official from the Sri Lankan Ministry of External Affairs said that they would be willing to repatriate the ex-Sri Lankan soldiers based on their willingness to leave.

“However, it seems like they want to leave only after they are paid,” he said. \

Family members of the group of Sri Lankan soldiers have been constantly in touch with them and have complained to the job agency which found the vacancies for the soldiers.

However, the outcome has not been favorable as the family members of the soldiers constantly received a negative response from the job agency.

The Chairman of the Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment, Kingsley Ranawaka told Haveeru that they have previously warned Sri Lankan migrant workers seeking employment in Iraq.

He said that the Sri Lankan government is doing its best to negotiate with the employer to settle the salaries and to repatriate the 41 ex-Sri Lankan soldiers in Iraq.

 “The family members of the group of Sri Lankan soldiers have been in touch with us. Through our External Affairs Ministry, we are trying to get them back home safe. The matter is very complex as we do not have a foreign mission representing Iraq in Sri Lanka,” he said.

 “We have previously warned Sri Lankan migrant workers not to go to Iraq. We have certain procedures when it comes to obtaining employment and we believe that the group of 41 soldiers have not followed our guidelines. We believe that they have managed to get the job through a rogue job agency,” he said.

The company in question is said to owe each ex-Sri Lankan soldier over US$18,000 in salary arrears. (Haveeru online)