A reporter and photographer risked arrest when they covered a story about aid being distributed in Sri Lanka.

Derby Evening Telegraph reporter Mario Cacciottolo and photographer Ben Russell travelled to the tsunami-hit country.

They wanted to see hundreds of Aquaboxes, bought with money raised from the paper’s Give The Water of Life campaign, handed over to people living in a refugee camp in Batticaloa town.

But the distribution network was so tied up with red tape that they stepped in to help, and found themselves covering the story of how other foreign aid, including clothes, bottles of water and medicines, was delayed at a warehouse for three months.

Mario said: “It was just sitting there covered in dust – I didn’t even realise it was aid until I saw the labels. I spoke to a worker who said it had been there three months.”

Realising they had uncovered another story, Ben began trying to secretly take photographs – risking possible arrest as they had already been told that photography was strictly prohibited in the port.

The pair had planned to act merely as observers on their nine-day visit and spend time meeting people involved with distributing the Telegraph appeal Aquaboxes, which can provide people with clean water for months.

But they also found the Aquaboxes stored at the Port of Colombo, with no indication of when they would be released.

As time was limited Mario and Ben decided to plead with officials to help them get them moving – with Mario at one point even offering to pay the £300 for the lorry out of his own pocket.

Mario said: “The next day we spent more than 12 hours in the port pestering officials to check the container. By this time we had seen a refugee camp with people left with only what they were stood up in and we felt it should be with them and there was no good reason why it wasn’t.

“We were supposed to be following at a distance but we ended up pushing the shipment through.

“There were 200 aid containers at the port, of which ours was one of them, but there was no priority system – the officials just pick a container.”