[StBernard] TAMING THE TAMIL TIGERS

[Westley Annis]

TAMING THE TAMIL TIGERS

>From Here in the U.S.   

01/10/08   
As terrorist groups go, it has quite a résumé:

Perfected the use of suicide bombers;
Invented the suicide belt;
Pioneered the use of women in suicide attacks;
Murdered some 4,000 people in the past two years alone; and
Assassinated two world leaders—the only terrorist organization to do so.
No, it’s not al Qaeda or Hezbollah or even HAMAS. The group is called the
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) or the Tamil Tigers for short.

Needless to say, the Tamil Tigers are among the most dangerous and deadly
extremists in the world. For more than three decades, the group has launched
a campaign of violence and bloodshed in Sri Lanka, the island republic off
the southern coast of India.

Its ultimate goal: to seize control of the country from the Sinhalese ethnic
majority and create an independent Tamil state. Along the way, it has
launched suicide attacks, assassinated politicians (including a government
minister this week and even the Sri Lankan President), taken hostages, and
committed all of kinds of crimes to finance its operations. The resulting
civil war has taken the lives of nearly 70,000 Sri Lankans on both sides of
the conflict since 1983 alone. 

Why should you care? Certainly because of the suffering and bloodshed that
the Tamil Tigers have caused. And because its ruthless tactics have inspired
terrorist networks worldwide, including al Qaeda in Iraq. But also because
the group has placed operatives right here in our own backyard, discreetly
raising money to fund its bloody terrorist campaign overseas, including
purchases of weapons and explosives. 

The U.S. government has designated the Tigers a foreign terrorist
organization, so their activities here are illegal. And we’re determined to
stop them, using the full range of our investigative and intelligence
capabilities. 

In April, for example, we struck an important blow when our Joint Terrorism
Task Force in New York arrested the alleged U.S. director of the Tigers. The
man supposedly held several fundraising events at a church and various
public schools in Queens and in northern New Jersey in 2004. He is also
accused of arranging high-level meetings between the group’s leaders and
U.S. supporters.

We’ve also arrested another 11 Tamil Tiger-related suspects in the New York
City region. And in Baltimore, following a multi-agency investigation, a
pair of Indonesian men pled guilty and were sentenced recently for working
with others to export surface to air missiles, state-of-the-art firearms,
machine guns, and night vision goggles to the Tigers in Sri Lanka. 

You can help by being careful with your donations. Like other terrorists,
the Tigers have raised funds under a variety of cover organizations, often
by posing as charities. A great deal of money, for example, was raised for
the Tigers following the 2004 tsunami that devastated Sri Lanka and many
other countries.

And please report any suspicious activities to your local field office or
anonymously through this website.