Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa has pardoned five fishermen from Tamil Nadu, who were convicted of drug trafficking offences in October.

The men will be released without conditions in the next few days, said Deputy Minister of Telecommunication and Information Technology Prabha Ganesan, who conveyed the news to the Indian high commission in Colombo.

The move comes soon after the Indian government said it is filing an appeal against the sentencing.

India’s external affairs ministry spokesperson Syed Akbaruddin said to reporters earlier on Wednesday that the government “gives high priority to the issue of the five Indian fishermen” and “will pursue all avenues”.

“I can confirm to you today that on behalf of those five Indian fishermen an appeal in the Sri Lankan Supreme Court has been filed,” he said, adding that a top Colombo lawyer had been hired for the case.

"He is amongst the top lawyers in Sri Lanka and he has filed that appeal. The Government of India will bear all costs of this appeal. We will pursue this, as I had repeatedly said, to the best of our ability. We are confident that justice will prevail in this case," Akbaruddin said.

Sri Lanka insisted it is “not scared” of the appeal, reported CNN-IBN.

"Was asked to inform the Indian high commission to withdraw/cancel their appeal against the death sentence as the case would otherwise drag out for months," Ganesan said to media.

Also see our earlier posts:

India gives 'unstinted support' to death row fishermen (04 November 2014)

Wife of death row fisherman seeks Madras High Court action (01 November 2014)

Protests in Tamil Nadu against SL death sentence to fishermen (31 Oct 2014)

Sri Lanka sentences 5 Tamil Nadu fishermen to death, India says men innocent (30 Oct 2014)