Lanka urged Maldives to allow its fishermen in territorial sea waters

Abdulla Yameen, the President of Maldives during his visit to Sri Lanka Colombo has been asked by Sri Lanka to allow its fisherman the facility of innocent passage through its territorial waters to the Arabian Sea. A discussion on the matter was done during a bilateral meeting between the delegations in Colombo on 22 January 2014.
 
This is the first visit of Yameen to Sri Lanka since he assumed the office of the President. He is on a three day official visit to Colombo. Similar such request has been made by Sri Lanka to India following the cross of local fishermen of the country have to cross the international boundary for tuna fishing.

Apart from this bilateral meet, Abdullah Yameen also met Mahinda Rajapaksa, the President of Sri Lanka and both sides also agreed to strengthen bilateral cooperation in trade, banking and finance, agriculture, fisheries, defence and maritime sectors and education.

United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea
The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), which is also called as the Law of the Sea Convention or the Law of the Sea treaty. It is an international agreement that came into existence of the third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS III), which took place between 1973 and 1982. The Law of the Sea Convention has defined the rights and responsibilities of nations in their use of the world's oceans. It also provides the rights to establish guidelines for businesses, the environment, and the management of marine natural resources to the countries. The Convention, concluded in 1982 and it replaced four 1958 treaties. UNCLOS came into force in 1994 a year after Guyana became the 60th nation to sign the treaty. At present 165 countries of the world as well as the European Union has joined the Convention. This is a data as per the membership of August 2013.