|
World
steps up grip on LTTE
The
LTTE is estimated to harvest between an estimated USD 50 million
to USD 75 million a month, from their fundraising organisations
and Tamil Diaspora; engaging in businesses using the Internet,
community-based Tamil radio stations and subscription satellite
TV, drug pedalling, particularly heroin from Southeast and
Southwest Asia, shipping lines, travel agencies, human smuggling;
as well as, fixed income generation methods, such as Registration
of the Tamil Diaspora. LTTE has their affiliated businesses
like restaurants and small hotels, share investment in share
markets in Europe and Far East and Singapore.
Diplomats, be vigilant
LTTE collects million of dollars from the Tamil Diaspora and
their affiliated organisations for the past 25 years. Some
of our Diplomats, instead of carrying counter-LTTE propaganda
are mostly engaged in their personal work. Due to this, the
country is suffering, internationally too.
•LTTE International network
Australia, the United Kingdom (UK), Canada, France and the
United States (US) and Europe account roughly for a 750,000
strong Sri Lankan Tamil Diaspora, from where the outfit accrues
its greatest financial and propaganda support, have taken
stern action against LTTE proxies, severely affecting the
Tigers capacities in their final war of liberation.
The LTTE organisations now operate from countries, that also
include India, Botswana, Burma, Cambodia, Denmark, Germany,
Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Qatar, South Africa, Switzerland
and Thailand, to name a few. The LTTE political wing has established
its branches in at least 12 countries, including the US.
Veerakathy Manivannam aka Castro is the Head of the LTTE and
International Secretariat. He has appointed leaders in each
and every country. He communicates with those leaders using
satellite phones and via e-mail. He is using inmasat satellite
modem, to communicate on the Internet and using this modem,
he can send email and surf the net to watch LTTE videos and
view pictures. This inmasat modem is capable to send data
and transfer pictures at high speed. LTTE has several inmasat
modems. From this inmasat modem, Praba and his wife have video
chats with their daughter in Scotland. It is a high powered
medium of communication, which the LTTE possesses. This kind
of sophisticated devices help the LTTE, to smoothly run its
international networks, acoording to reliable sources, from
Kilinochchi.
The LTTE global activities can broadly be summarised into
three principal categories: fundraising; arms procurement
and shipping, publicity and propaganda. Though each of these
tasks invariably overlaps, there is a significant autonomy
of operation in each.
The LTTE has created front organisations in about 50 countries
across the globe, and most significant among these organisations
is the Australasian Federation of Tamil Associations; the
Swiss Federation of Tamil Associations; the French Federation
of Tamil Associations; the Federation of Associations of Canadian
Tamils; the Illankai Tamil Sangam in the US; the Tamil Coordinating
Committee in Norway and the International Federation of Tamils
in the UK. These fronts also form sympathetic pressure groups
and media units, to harness political and economic support
for the outfit, from the politicians and human rights activists
in the respective countries. They bring out or operate numerous
magazines, radio and TV stations; carry out public demonstrations,
display LTTE flags and emblems, as well as photographs of
its leader Velupillai Prabhakaran and other leaders, sell
and distribute literature glorifying the LTTE struggle and
suicide attacks, and engage in publicity and propaganda among
Tamil Diaspora, to harness support and contributions. .
These activities are, of course, subordinate to the principal
objective of the International Secretariat to generate maximum
financial resources, to support the LTTE’s final war
in Sri Lanka. The LTTE is estimated to harvest between an
estimated USD 50 million to USD 75 million a month, through
organizations, such as the Federation of Associations of Canadian
Tamils, Human Rights for Tamils, Melrose Publishers, The Tamil
Center for Human Rights, The Tamil Coordinating Committee
(TCC), The Tamil Elam Economic Development Organisation, the
Tamil Relief Organisation (TRO), The Tamil Youth Organisation
(TYO), The United Tamil Organisation, The White Pigeon, the
World Tamil Movement (WTO), The World Tamil Association (WTA)
etc.
These organisations collect funds from individuals and businesses;
by managing Hindu Temples principally serving Tamil Diaspora
communities; engaging in businesses including the Internet,
community-based Tamil radio stations and subscription satellite
TV, drug pedalling, particularly heroin from Southeast and
Southwest Asia, shipping lines, travel agencies, human smuggling;
as well as, fixed income generation methods, such as the Registration
of the Tamil Diaspora. LTTE has their affiliated business
like restaurants and small hotels, invest in share markets
in Europe and the Far East and Singapore. Over the years,
the LTTEs international support network has ensured that,
the Tigers became the only terrorist organisation to have
Ground, Sea and Air capability.
LTTE international arms procurement activity into five main
zones of geographic operation:
-
1 Northeast and Southeast Asia, mainly, China, North Korea,
Cambodia, Thailand, Hong Kong, Vietnam and Burma
-
2 Southwest Asia, mainly, Afghanistan and Pakistan (through
the so-called ‘Afghan pipeline’).
-
3 The Former Soviet Union, focussing mainly Ukraine.
-
4 Southeastern Europe and the Middle East, mainly, Lebanon,
Cyprus, Greece, Bulgaria and Turkey.
-
5 Africa, mainly, Nigeria, Zimbabwe and South Africa
Global crackdown on LTTE cells
On June 19, 2008, Italian Police arrested 33 suspected cadres
of LTTE in pre-dawn raids across the country. Police in Naples
said that, the suspects were picked up in 10 cities including
Rome, Genoa, Bologna, Naples and Palermo at the end of a two-year
investigation. Two more were being sought in Naples.
“They had formed an organisation, that was arranging
financially supported by collecting a tax, or an extortion
payment, from Sri Lankans living here,” said Palermo
prosecutor Antonio Ingroia. Investigators would determine,
if they could also charge the collectors, for extortion.
June 17, 2008 Toronto,Canada has banned the World Tamil Movement
(WTM) and frozen its assets, for raising funds for the Liberation
Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). After a long probe, the police
raided its Toronto and Montreal offices in 2006 and seized
truckloads of incriminating documents. Under the law, anyone
giving funds to a banned organisation can be jailed for 10
years and anyone who raises funds for it, faces up to 14 years
behind bars.
April 11, 2008: Counterterrorism police in Quebec and Ontario
in Canada, reportedly shut down the World Tamil Movement (WTM)
office in Montreal, alleging that the organisation has been
raising money to finance terrorist activities in Sri Lanka.
January 10, 2008: A US District Court in Maryland sentenced,
Thirunavukarasu Varatharasa, a Sri Lankan resident in the
US, to 57 months in prison and three years of supervised release,
for conspiracy to provide arms, ammunition and other military
material to the LTTE.
October 21, 2007: The Royal Canadian Mounted Police Senior
Liaison Officer for the Caribbean disclosed that, more than
100 people, including key members of the LTTE, were arrested
in the Caribbean with fraudulent travel documents, including
Western forged passports, with the aim of entering the US
and Canada.
September 25, 2007: French Police arrested Ranjan, who was
appointed by the Wanni LTTE, to take charge of LTTE activities
in France, after the arrest of Parithi aka Nadarajah Mathienthiram,
who was earlier in charge of operations in this country.
August 14, 2007: Three top LTTE suspects, Sujit Gunapala,
Sasiljaran Teverajah and Satiepawan Arseawatap were deported
to Sri Lanka. Gunapala, Teverajah and Arseawatap were arrested
from the Ranong province in Thailand on May 12, 2003, with
10 Glock pistols and three HK Mark 23 pistols, and had remained
under detention in Thailand for attempting to smuggle weapons
to Sri Lanka.
June 21, 2007: Arunachalam Chrishanthakumar alias Shanthan,
president of the British Tamil Association, the high-ranking
agent of the LTTE, and head of finance, Goldan Lambert, were
arrested by the British Police under the 2000 Terrorism Act.
Subsequently, on July 5, 2007, a British Court froze all bank
accounts belonging to Shanthan and his wife, whose business
ventures, up to July 2, 2007, amounted to four billion sterling
pounds.
May 17, 2007: The Maldives Coast Guard opened fire on and
sank a small vessel carrying suspected LTTE cadres, after
a 12-hour standoff at sea in the southern territorial waters
of the Maldives. The boat was carrying guns, mortar and ammunition.
May 1, 2007: Australian Police arrested two suspected LTTE
cadres, Aruran Vinayagamoorthy (who had access to USD 5,26,000
in two bank accounts between August 2001 and December 2005)
and Sivarajah Yathavan, after raids in Sydney and Melbourne.
April 28, 2007: Six Sri Lankans, including the prime accused
Satrubarajah Shanamugarajah alias Ruby, connected to the LTTE,
were convicted for organised crime in Norway. More than Norwegian
Kroner 5.3 million had reportedly been stolen in Norway’s
largest credit card scam, with links to LTTE cells in Canada,
England, Germany and Sweden.
April 25, 2007: The director of the LTTE in New York, Karunakaran
Kandasamy, was arrested by the FBI in Queens, on charges of
providing material support to a foreign terrorist organisation.
A FBI raid on Kandasamy’s office in Queens revealed evidence
that, he had raised millions of dollars for the Tamil Tigers,
through a front organisation called the World Tamil Coordinating
Committee.
April 1, 2007: The leader of the LTTE France branch since
2003, Nadarajah Mathinthiran alias Parathi and Thuraisamy
Jeyamorthy alias ‘Jeyaâ,’ who are in charge
of fundraising in France, were among 17 LTTE suspects arrested.
During 2006, the LTTE reportedly collected more than Euro
six million, forcing each Tamil family to pay Euro 2000 per
year and each Tamil shopkeeper Euro 6000 per year.
March 8, 2007: Haji Subandi, an international arms dealer
from Indonesia, pleaded guilty in a federal court, in Guam
in USA, for conspiring to export guns, surface-to-air missiles
and other military hardware to the LTTE.
August 30, 2006: Indonesian police arrested 13 LTTE suspects
during a raid in the southern Java coast. The suspects were
reportedly moving to Australia.
August 22, 2006: 13 suspects with close links to the LTTE,
including Waterloo Suresh aka Suresh Skandarajah, were arrested
from Buffalo, New York, San Jose, California, Seattle, Washington
and Connecticut, following a RCMP and FBI probe into allegations
that, LTTE sympathisers in North America tried to buy missiles
and move terror funds.
April 16, 2006: Canadian Police raided the office of the WTM
in Montreal, the first raid after the Canadian Government
proscribed the LTTE as a terrorist group, and seized computers,
files, LTTE flags and other political documents.
LTTE’s international propaganda arm suffered a severe
blow
The Government of Israel on Saturday stopped a private Israeli
satellite provider Satlink from hosting the LTTE TV Tharishanam
(Revelation). Until then, Tharishanam TV was the live wire
between LTTE and Sri Lankan Tamils in Europe. After radicalising
the Sri Lankan Tamils, the LTTE recruited them as supporters
and exploited them for funds.
This is after the LTTE had suffered a set of reversals starting
with the closure of Tamil Television Net (TTN) in France,
in May 2007. The closed down TTN pay channel had 22,000 subscribers
drawing Euro Dollars 330,000 per month. Thereafter, LTTE sponsored
Tharishanam TV signed an agreement with ‘Makkalia TV’.
‘Makkalia TV’ is owned by PMK, a nationalist Tamil
political party led by Dr Ramadoss in India, to telecast selected
Makkalia TV programmes under Tharishanam logo, to Europe in
May 2007.
Subsequently, Tharishanam expanded its programmes to Europe,
through agreements reached with Israel based Satlink and France
based Globecast companies. Scheduling of programs of Tharishanam
is being done from Israel, in accordance with the instructions
given by Tharishanam office, based in Switzerland/Australia.
Thereafter, Satlink telecasts these programmes to the viewers
in Europe, through ‘Hotbird’, another satellite
belonging to Eutelsat in coordination with Globecast, a France
based Satellite Company.
In May 2008, Israel based RRSat commenced telecasting programmes
of LTTE sponsored Euro TV. Transmissions of this TV was earlier
ceased by Milan authorities, due to its connection with the
LTTE. However RRSat ceased transmissions, once the matter
was brought to the notice of the authorities. RRSat is also
involved in the latest attempt made by the LTTE, in June 2008,
to recommence VOT (Voice of Tigers) transmissions, through
Serbia. However, due to timely intervention by the Sri Lankan
authorities, this too was stopped. In March, the Italian authorities
closed down an illegal LTTE propaganda TV channel operating
from Italian territory.
|
