Sri Lanka hands over 45 Iranian sailors’ bodies to embassy

Sri Lanka on Friday (March 13, 2026) handed over the bodies of 45 sailors killed in an attack on an Iranian warship off the island nation’s coast to Iran’s embassy, the officials said.

The Chief Magistrate, Sameera Dodangoda, gave the order on March 11 to the Director of the National Hospital at Karapitiya following a request by the Galle harbour police.

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Last week on Wednesday, Sri Lanka said it had recovered 84 bodies of Iranian sailors after the U.S. submarine attack sank the Iranian frigate IRIS Dena off Galle on the island’s southern coast.

The ship was returning to Iran from Visakhapatnam, India, where it had participated in a naval fleet review exercise.

The 45 bodies would be repatriated to Iran on Friday from the southern international airport at Mattala, the Defence Ministry Secretary Sampath Thuiyakontha told reporters.

The bodies were brought to the hospital along with 32 survivors from the U.S. torpedo attack last Thursday.

The Sri Lankan government had earlier said they will be keeping the bodies until the situation would improve so as to repatriate them.

They were being kept under makeshift refrigeration as the hospital’s morgue capacity was found inadequate.

The 32 survivors had been discharged on Sunday and sent to the nearby Sri Lankan airbase at Koggala, Galle.