LONDON INITIATIVE Public Policy Think Tank Report Date: October 28, 2020 Report on Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) Proscription in the U.K. Under Terrorism Act, 2000 Discussion on Open Judgment By Neville Hewage, Ph.D. Canada Jayaraj Palihawadena, LLB, Solicitor U.K. 1 Authors are thankful to Public Policy Research Group of the Ontario Centre for Policy Research, Canada for their support for the report. www.policy-research.ca Canada 2 ABOUT THE AUTHORS Neville Hewage, Ph.D. (Canada) Dr. Hewage is an Adjunct Professor and Research Fellow at the International Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Law at Laurentian University, Ontario, Canada. He obtained his doctorate from Laurentian University, Canada. Dr. Hewage is also served as a Senior Policy Analyst at the Ontario Centre for Policy Research (OCPR), Ottawa, Canada. OCPR is a Think Tank involved in research on public policy, global terrorism, and extremist violence.OCPR provides support to prepare a strategic framework for countering terrorism and targeted violence to its stakeholders. The Strategic Framework introduces a mechanism for crafting a new definition of the critical concept of targeted violence, which will further help to ensure a common understanding of the threat, allowing for better discussion, approaches to mitigation, and resource allocation. Dr. Hewage is also on the Infrastructure Protection and International Security (MISIP) program, Norman Paterson School of International Affairs, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada. For over 40 years, The Norman Paterson School of International Affairs (NPSIA) has been training Canada’s best and brightest graduate students in international affairs. Contact Mailing Address Ontario Centre for Policy Research 2581 River Mist Road, Ottawa, ON, K2J 6G1 CANADA. Tel: + 1 613 612 7615 e-mail: [email protected] OR [email protected] Jayaraj Palihawadana, LLB, Solicitor (UK) Mr. Palihawadana obtained a Bachelor of Law (LLB) from the Open University of Sri Lanka. He is a practicing lawyer in the U.K. He has vast experience in litigation, conflict resolution and transnational politics. Mr. Palihawadana is an activist, and his most recent role is being in the Human Rights Commission as an Ambassador to the U.K. Contact Mailing address London Initiative 08 Throne Road, Slough, SL3 7UQ U.K. Tel: + 44 7517 727933 email: [email protected] OR [email protected] 3 Contents Description Page About the Authours 3 Contents 4 Executive Summary 5 Part I – Review of Open Judgement 6 Background 6 Facts 7 Issues 9 Statutory Framework 10 Issues 1 and Issue 3 11 Analysis and Discussion 11 Affiliation with global terror network 11 Money Laundering for Terrorism 13 Human Smuggling 13 Tamil Eelam Cyber Force 14 Rationale 14 Belief or Suspicion 15 Issue 2 and Issue 3 16 Analysis and Discussion 16 LTTE Events Promotes or encourage terrorism and unlawful 17 glorification Conclusion 21 Part II – LTTE as a threat to social order and British Society 22 Radicalization 24 Abusing the U.K. asylum system 25 Part III Current Judicial proceedings against LTTE 27 4 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY A transnational terrorist group, Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), is one of the world’s most ruthless and wealthiest terrorist groups. Group’s annual income is about US$300 million. They have raised funds from human smuggling, associated with other terror groups by selling and smuggling weapons, money laundering, drug trafficking and other illegal activities. Proscribed Organizations Appeal Commission (POAC) also heard that LTTE international network is still intact, even when the group was militarily defeated. Our report highlights LTTE’s international terror network. It has raised serious questions of facts that need to be considered before deproscription. However, POAC failed to evaluate these facts in its decision. When preparing Part I of the report, we have not considered LTTE’s violent past. We have evaluated the most current activities of the LTTE. LTTE’s past activities have been analyzed to determine the group’s pattern of conduct. We have concluded that it is reasonable to believe LTTE is concerned with terrorism pursuant to s 5 (3) (d) of Terrorism Act, 2000. Therefore, its proscription should remain and include in schedule 2. Part II of the report provides a briefing of how the LTTE activities threaten the social order and British society. Tamil gangs are a result of the refugee crisis created by the LTTE. Tamil gangs are involved with credit card scams and street violence. Coercion by the LTTE has become a widespread problem in the U.K.’s Tamil enclaves. This is particularly troubling since many of the Tamil refugees in the U.K. originally fled Sri Lanka because of the LTTE's persecution, not by the ruling majority. Thus, a peculiar arrangement now exists in the U.K.’s Tamil enclaves, with persecutors entrenched among their victims in a distant receiving state. In this case, refugee status has failed to deliver the protection it promises to the persecuted. Part III of the report provides the most recent court cases against LTTE as a result of their failed attempt to revive the organization. However, vigilant security and intelligence apparatus in Sri Lanka were able to thaw LTTE attempts. Transnational organized terrorist group LTTE and their network will pose serious and growing threats to British citizens' security. LTTE and its global criminal enterprise will contribute to increased social violence, erode governments’ authorities, undermine the integrity of international financial systems and security. The report also highlights how deproscription will result in a massive influx of asylum seekers. LTTE’s international human smuggling network is ready to bring thousands of asylum seekers to the U.K. Finally, the deproscription of the transnational terror group LTTE should be considered not only legal means, how it will affect the public and foreign policy of the U.K., in a broader concept. 5 PART I REVIEW OF OPEN JUDGEMENT BACKGROUND 01 The transnational terror group, Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), represents a particularly violent manifestation of the ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka. The group threatens Sri Lanka and India's domestic stability and the security of the international system as a whole.1 The LTTE is a terrorist group fighting for a separate mono-ethnic Tamil state in the North and East of Sri Lanka. The LTTE's International Secretariat is based in the U.K. and is responsible for its press releases. The U.K. is also a source of funds for the LTTE. 02. The Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam (TGTE) advocates for a separate Tamil state but does not have widespread support within Sri Lanka. Most Tamils have more pressing concerns such as housing, employment, land return and accessing information about relatives who disappeared during the armed conflict. 2 03. There have been three earlier applications to remove the LTTE from Schedule 2. They were all refused; the most recent was in 2014. 04. Five members of the Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam (TGTE); Arumugam, and others appealed against a decision of the Secretary of State dated March 08, 2019, to refuse their application to remove the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam from the list of organizations proscribed under the Terrorism Act 2000. 1 Chalk, P. Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam’s (LTTE) International Organization and Operations - A Preliminary Analysis, Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CISIS), Commentary 77. https://fas.org/irp/world/para/docs/com77e.htm#N_1_ 2 Report of a Home Office fact-finding mission to Sri Lanka (January 20, 2020) Home Office, UK. (https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/fil e/859277/Sri_Lanka_FFM_report_2020.pdf 6 05. The proscribed Organizations Appeal Commission (POAC) held that the decision is flawed. The commission, therefore, allowed the appeal. 06. To continue the proscription of the organization (LTTE), their activities must contravene with s 3 (5) (d) the Terrorism Act 2000 at the time of the submission and to date. FACTS 07. The U.S. Department of State's Country Reports on Terrorism for 2014 states that "[d]espite its military defeat at the hands of the Sri Lankan government in 2009, the LTTE's international network of sympathizers and financial support persists". 3 08. According to a list of "terrorist entities" published by the Government of Canada's Department of Public Safety, "[a]lthough the LTTE was militarily defeated in May 2009, subversion, destabilization, and fundraising continues, particularly in the diaspora." 4 09. In 2016, the police recovered two separate stocks of explosives and a suicide kit, leading to the arrest of approximately twenty-five people, including five former LTTE leaders.5 10. The UNHRC, U.N. Refugee Agency Refworld reported (published by U.S. Department of State) that….[t]otal of thirteen LTTE supporters, several of whom had allegedly planned attacks against U.S. and Israeli diplomatic facilities in India, were arrested in Malaysia in 2014. Additional members were arrested in Malaysia and India in 2015, one of whom was accused of exhorting other Sri Lankans to fund and revive the LTTE. LTTE's financial support network 3 United States (US). June 2015. Department of State. "Sri Lanka." Country Reports on Terrorism 2014. https://www.refworld.org/docid/5bcf1f33a.html 4 Canada. 20 November 2014. Public Safety Canada. "Currently Listed Entities: Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE)." https://www.publicsafety.gc.ca/cnt/ntnl-scrt/cntr-trrrsm/lstd-ntts/crrnt-lstd-ntts- en.aspx#46 5 Country Reports on Terrorism 2016, (2017). Us Department of State. https://www.state.gov/reports/country-reports-on-terrorism-2016/ 7 continued after the LTTE's military defeat in 2009 and employed charities as fronts to collect and divert funds for its activities. 6 11. Malaysian police counter-terrorism chief Ayob Khan Mydin Pitchay said in his statement, “there are attempts from certain quarters from outside Sri Lanka, not just in Malaysia, to reactivate the LTTE movement, after arresting two politicians suspected of links to the Sri Lankan terrorist group.” 7 12.