Saturday, January 7 2006 10:44 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Mumbai: Maharashtra Police yesterday (Jan 06, 2006) said that it has found explosives in containers, which reportedly slipped overboard from MV Eugenia, which was on its way to Afghanistan for the road jobs undertaken by Border Roads Organisation (BRO).

"The preliminary inspection of the three containers that were retrieved from the seabed contained explosives," state DGP P S Pasricha told sources.

He further said, "Experts were examining on the nature of explosives in the container."

Pasricha also said that fourth of the six containers have been located and efforts are being made to retrieve the same.

The containers, containing nearly 100 metric tonne explosives, despatched on Honduran registered merchant vessel 'MV Eugenia' were dumped in deep sea, reportedly after the ship met rough weather.

But due to the sensitive nature of the issue in the present geo-political scenario, central agencies sounded alarm bells fearing that the explosives could land in wrong hands.

The core team is monitoring the recovery; Naval ships INS Nidesh, INS Alleppey and INS Ratnagiri are assisting in retrieval job along with naval deep-sea divers.

MV Eugenia left Mumbai port on December 23, but reports of disappearance of the containers reached on December 29, triggering a massive search and rescue operation.

The retrieval job is being done jointly by the Indian Navy, Coast Guard and the ONGC, while a core team consisting of officials of Intelligence Bureau, Customs, Mumbai Port Trust and Mumbai police, headed by Maharashtra Director General of Police, P S Pasricha is monitoring developments.