| The
PA Government’s Foreign Policy By a Special
correspondent
The foreign policy of a country has generally the following goals:
1) Protecting the country’s Sovereignty, Security and Territorial integrity,
2) Energising the Economy, through the promotion of Trade and Investment,
3) Promoting the image of the country abroad including the projection of its culture,
4) Countering false and damaging propaganda
The present government has failed in its diplomacy. Our Security remains threatened and
there is no country that is prepared to help us out even though this government claims to
have a special relationship with India. Today the Western block would not shed a tear if
this government goes out of office. They would in fact cheer. Even in the area of
countering LTTE propaganda, where we succeeded for a time, today the LTTE propaganda
machine is believed far more than the statements of the government.
The government claimed that its South Asia policy was a success —— but they
did nothing during Sri Lanka’s Presidency of SAARC and have not been able to convince
India to even attend the Summit that is due.
It was during the Premadasa administration that SAARC took off and in many respects
President P deserved much credit for it. It was within the framework of SAARC, for
instance, that our relationship with India improved.
At the time this government came into office in 1994 Sri Lanka was a member of ECOSOC,
We had a Judge on the World Court and we were among the more sought after countries for
support in the UN. Sri Lanka had been able to obtain better deals in the Garment quota
area than any other small country both into the US market and also into the European
Union.
So the government of Mrs. Kumaratunga did not inherit a hopeless situation. But not
having done their home work the Sri Lanka government read not only the world
‘wrong’, but also read India wrong. From about 1997 adopted a certain servile
attitude towards India. We shall revert to our relationship with India again later.
The first action of the new government in the foreign relations area was to throw away
as opportunity for which any country would have given an arm and a leg. We had last been
in the Security Council in the 1960 and one of the Asian seats was ours for the taking.
The government decided not to accept this opportunity and came to an agreement with the
Korean Republic to allow them to come in instead. In return the Koreans agreed to give
employment to at least 8000 Sri Lankan workers and to open a Bank in Sri Lanka — they
reneged on both counts. They were however able to buy our Steel Corporation for almost
nothing. That was this government’s first Foreign policy failure.
This government’s proclaimed commitment to Human Rights appeared to be so credible
that the US is said to have congratulated the Minister of Foreign Affairs for it. It was
the same with the leaders of the countries of Europe too. Our relations with the world
could not have been better. In fact the LTTE was roundly condemned for breaking the
ceasefire in 1995 and the government’s offensive against the LTTE was endorsed. This
situation obtained till about the middle of 1996 when the honeymoon began to end. The west
began to raise issues relating to Human Rights violations in the North by the security
forces. The government’s reactions were not well received. Meanwhile the government
had soured the relationship with Japan a country that has consistently helped us from the
early 50s. This government has gone out of its way to show what an ungrateful nation we
are. We have displeased them over a number of issues including the Hilton affair (The
President talks big about bringing Multi-Nationals into this country, but she failed to
appreciate the fact that a major Japanese company Mitsui Construction was prepared to
invest in the Hilton project shortly after the riots of 1983 — when no country wanted
to have anything to do with Sri Lanka. She also filed action against a man who was able to
bring the biggest name in the Hotel business in the world — HILTON — to this
country. This government also cancelled the Yen loan for the development of the Colombo
Port after five Japanese Ministries and Agencies had spent two years of their valuable
time working on the project. The government reneged on the Agreement with the Japanese and
signed a fresh Agreement with the P and O shipping company. The relationship with Japan
has further soured with our running a candidate for the post of Director General of UNESCO
which is being most eagerly sought by Japan.
This government has not yet recovered from their Socialist hang-over. They have a
particular phobia when it comes to dealing with the US. They have made a sense of mistakes
including the so called ‘Evans affair’. In this instance they signed an
Agreement to re-build the Janadhipathi Mawatha area destroyed by the Central Bank bomb (a
serious security lapse on the part of the government) and then changed their minds over
300 million Rupees of our money had to be paid out as compensation. The international
community based in Colombo — the Embassies believe that the main area, where this
government has ‘come a cropper’ has been with regard to Tenders. There has been
a perception that other considerations had entered into the awards of tenders. Such
perceptions by the ‘losers’ has done much damage to the image of the government.
They openly speak of how the Cabinet Tender Board decision was rejected and French ship
engines purchased for trains.
Though the government came in with the best of intentions to pursue a foreign policy
with an economic bias its energies have been dissipated countering LTTE propaganda
overseas. The one area in which government claimed to have succeeded was in countering
LTTE propaganda overseas, but there has been no let up in the LTTE success story overseas.
This government’s India policy has been a disaster. India is our immediate
neighbour with whom we in fact have ‘organic ties’ the origins of which are
shrouded in the mists of time. We must have the broadest and deepest possible relationship
with India. We should under no circumstances give India any cause for concern that even
the slightest threat to her security could come from our direction. She furthermore has
the capacity to hinder or help us prosper. We learned this to our bitter cost in the
1980s. In one word the India factor is crucial to our existence as a one country. No one
has any quarrel with that position. But the important fact is that we have been
independent of India for two thousand five hundred years. We have never been a vassal
state of any state of India neither have we been a satellite of India. We have been a
sovereign state.
This government has however compromised our sovereignty. The Foreign Minister in a
speech in Delhi on 19th November 1996 stated "Given that with her preponderance and
centrality within the region India has become for all practical purposes the principal
heir to that imperial tradition" — he was stating that India had for ‘all
practical purposes’ was the successor to the British Raj. He claimed that India
"could justifiably regard any alien presence of influence within her natural security
borders (which included Sri Lanka) which were not there with her own acquiescence as a
potential threat to her security". He further stated that India has a grave
responsibility for maintaining peace and stability in the region. Kadirgamar our Foreign
Minister was accepting that we could be sacrificed at the altar of India’s security
and further that India was the region’s policeman. The latter concept will never be
accepted by Pakistan or Bangladesh.
This government misunderstood as to how the relationship should be managed. Every time
a government changed in Delhi, (and that was often) Kadirgamar rushed to Delhi to pay
tribute (very much in the tradition of what vassal states did in years gone by). We became
to be laughing stock among the international community and more particularly in South Asia
because not even Bhutan nor Nepal rushed indecently to pay tribute.
This government has also compromised our sovereignty. The Foreign Minister in a speech
in Delhi on 19th November 1996 stated "Given that with her preponderance and
centrality within the region, India has become for all practical purposes the principal
heir to that imperial tradition" — he was stating that India had for ‘all
practical purposes’ was to be successor to the British Raj. He claimed that India
"could justifiably regard any alien presence of influence within her natural security
borders (which included Sri Lanka) which were not there with her own acquiescence as a
potential threat to her security’’. He further stated that India has a grave
responsibility for maintaining peace and stability in the region. Kadirgamar our Foreign
Minister was accepting that we could be sacrificed at the altar of India’s security
and further that India was the region’s policeman. The latter concept will never be
accepted by Pakistan or Bangladesh.
In May 1998 after the Indian and Pakistani Nuclear tests. After issuing a balanced
statement we went overboard as it were and issued another statement in answer to a
question by a reporter the Minister went on to state "We are certainly not opposed to
India becoming a Nuclear State". This statement was a serious mistake as we as
signatories to the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty had by treaty obligation to be opposed
to Nuclear testing by any none Nuclear state. Sri Lanka’s stand angered China and our
Minister had to go to China to explain himself and after the meeting in Beijing he told
the whole world what the Chinese had discussed with him. This not only angered China but
also India. No details of any discussion between two countries are revealed to the world
outside. Kadirgamar did not know this basic rule and antagonized our friends.
Because of our ‘socialist hangover’ we have antagonized the US, the UK and
the countries of the west. Most recently, in their usually irresponsible fashion, the
government accused Germany and Britain of assisting the UNP! This has not gone down well
with either these countries or their friends.
This government which refused to nominate Ambassador Jayantha Dhanapala to be Director
of the International Atomic Energy Agency, a post that was his for the taking spent Rs. 53
million of public money, in an effort to get a relative of the President a UN post. It is
also said that we bought jute gunny sacks from Bangladesh at Rs. 59 a sack when we till
that time were purchasing Polypropalene sacks at Rs 8 and incurred a loss of almost Rs.
400 million of public money to get Bangladesh to vote for the President’s relative,
but Bangladesh voted for Japan!
On the whole the success of a foreign policy can be gauged by the influence a country
has in the world - one measure of this would be the success a country has in the
assemblies and institutions of the world — particularly in the UN. Our record here
has been unprecedented. We have lost the Judgeship we held in the World Court, we lost our
seat in ECOSOC, we lost the election to the post of Director General of UNESCO, we
contested and lost a place in the Law Commission and last and we lost the seat we
contested in the UN Human Rights Sub Commission. What better proof of the bankruptcy of
our foreign policy!
In May 1998 after the Indian and Pakistani Nuclear tests. After issuing a balanced
statement we went overboard as it were and issued another statement in answer to a
question by a reporter, the Minister went on to state "We are certainly not opposed
to India becoming a Nuclear State". This statement was a serious mistake as we as
signatories to the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty had by treaty obligation to be opposed
to Nuclear testing by any non Nuclear state. Sri Lanka’s stand angered China and our
Minister had to go to China to explain himself and after the meeting in Beijing he told
the whole world what the Chinese bad discussed with him. This not only angered China but
also India. No details oŁ any discussion between two countries are revealed to the world
outside. Kadirgamar did not know this basic rule and antagonized our friends.
Because of the present government’s ‘socialist hangover’ we have
antagonized the US, the UK and the countries of the west. Most recently, in their usually
irresponsible fashion, the government accused Germany and Britain of assisting the UNP!
This has not gone down well with either these countries or their friends.
Our continued useless involvement with the Non Aligned and our continued estrangement
with Israel long after even Egypt and Jordan have friendly relations with that country is
not in our national interest. We also continue to support causes that bring us no return.
The time has come to ask whether such involvement and support makes sense. This government
has ruined the image of the country abroad.
If there is one thing which we need more than anything else just now is an abundance of
goodwill of other nations. The success of a foreign policy can be gauged by the influence
a country has in the world - one measure of this would be the success a country has in the
assemblies and institutions of the world — particularly in the UN. Our record here
has been unprecedented. We have lost the Judgeship we held in the World Court, we lost our
seat in ECOSOC, we lost the election to the post of Director General of UNESCO, we
contested and lost a place in the Law Commission and last and we lost the seat we
contested in the UN Human Rights Sub Commission. What better proof of the bankruptcy of
our foreign policy!
International
Cooperation Needed to Combat Terrorism - Madeleine Albright
Secretary of State Albright says that although "the face of terror is changing,
the need for international cooperation to protect our people and our interests is
not."
She told reporters May 1 that the United States helps friendly governments through
diplomacy and training programs to "improve border security and share information
about those suspected of being affiliated with terrorist networks."
Albright made her comments in conjunction with the State Department’s release of
its annual "Patterns of Global Terrorism Report." The Secretary said the 1999
edition tells a story about terrorism "that is largely heartening" because it
describes terrorists who have been caught and plots thwarted as well as innocent lives
saved.
Following is the text of Albright’s remarks as delivered:
Today we are releasing the State Department’s Annual Report on Patterns of Global
Terrorism. The story it tells this year is largely heartening, one of terrorists caught,
plots thwarted and lives saved, which means that worldwide casualties fell sharply; and
the number of Americans killed, while still entirely unacceptable, was the lowest in seven
years.
The overall number of terrorist incidents did rise by more than 40 percent, reversing
what had been a welcome trend. But this reflected many non-lethal attacks conducted in
response to the capture by Turkish authorities of PKK terrorist leader Abdullah Ocalan.
That marked a major victory in the fight against terrorism, and it meant that even this
one statistical step backward signified a larger stride forward.
But the picture for 1999 easily could have been composed of more shadow than light.
Imagine if suspected Algerian terrorist Ahmed Ressam had managed to carry out a bombing
when he sought to enter the United States in December from Canada. Or if the al-Qaida
terrorist network had acted on its plans to attack Americans during millennium
celebrations in Jordan.
And that’s why we cannot relax our global full court press against terror, and
it’s why I have made this a top personal priority as Secretary of State, and why we
will continue to work with other countries that want to make progress - not by pointing
fingers, but by linking arms.
This year’s report also reflects changes in the nature of our common foe. We are
seeing a shift from well-organized local groups supported by state sponsors to more
far-flung and loosely structured webs of terror. We’re detecting a shift from state
funding to private sponsorship in criminal enterprises, such as blackmail and trafficking
in drugs, guns and even human beings. And we’re seeing an eastward shift in the
terrorism center of gravity from the Middle East to South Asia, particularly Afghanistan.
But while the face of terror is changing, the need for international cooperation to
protect our people and our interests is not. Through our diplomacy and training programs,
we help friendly governments to improve border security and share information about those
suspected of being affiliated with terrorist networks. We offer rewards for terrorist
suspects and gather information to advise and warn Americans. We strive to forge
international agreements and cooperation that will leave terrorists with no place to run,
hide, do their dirty work, or stash their assets.
And we do all we can to bring suspected terrorists before the bar of justice, as we
have in such major cases as the 1998 bombing of two US embassies in Africa and the
sabotage of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in which a long-awaited trial is
scheduled to begin the day after tomorrow.
All this doesn’t come cheap, but the resources we seek from Congress to conduct
our programs, protect our people and secure our embassies and buildings against attack are
not a luxury. They are a practical and moral necessity, and a national security bargain.
I am gravely concerned, therefore, by congressional proposals to slash more than $2
billion from the President’s international affairs funding request. These reductions
will harm plans to upgrade security and complicate efforts to counter terror. This is no
time to shortchange American leadership. Congress should approve the President’s full
request.
For the past several years, the list of state sponsors of terror has gone unchanged,
but that doesn’t mean it is unchangeable; on the contrary, the very purpose of this
process is to get countries out of the terrorism business and off the list. Governments
that would like to see their names removed know exactly what they must do: stop
supporting, financing or planning terrorist acts, and stop harboring or interfering with
the pursuit and prosecution of those who commit them.
In closing, I want to commend the State Department’s Counter-Terrorism
Coordinator, Ambassador Mike Sheehan, and his team for their tireless efforts. And to our
many partners in other agencies and other countries, I say a hearty thank you. We
appreciate what you’ve done and what you’re doing, and we look forward to
working with you in the future.
(Distributed by the Office of International Information Programs, U.S.
Department of State.
Bird Watch
The Black-winged Kite: The hovering raptor
by Jagath Gunawardena
All the hawks, eagles, falcons and vultures are collectively known as raptors or
diurnal birds of prey and are members of the order Falconifarmers. Thirty-two species
representing three families in this order have been recorded from Sri Lanka. Of these 25
species belong to the family Accipitidae and 15 of them are residents. It is notable that
there are no endemic species of raptors in Sri Lanka. The Black-winged kite, also known as
the Black-shouldered Kite (Elanus caeruleus) is a small member of the family Accipitidae
renowned for the ability to hover or hang in the air like a helicopter. In Sinhala it is
called the Kurulu-goya, Ukussa and Patan Ukussa.
It is about 33 cm (13 inches) long, or about the size of a House crow, and has a
slender build and the characteristic short stout and strongly-hooked bill, typical to most
raptors. The long painted wings proceed well beyond the tail when at rest. The middle tail
feathers are shorter than the others giving it a slightly folked appearence. The legs are
short and strong with strong feet and hooked claws. The upper parts of the body are a
greyish-white while the underparts and the tail are pure white. A short black line goes
through the deep red eyes. The black bill has a prominent yellow core at the base. The
legs and feet are yellow. The black patches on the wings are conspicuous both during rest
and at flight. The black tips to the wings show clearly only in flight. Males and females
are similar in colouration but the females are larger, a feature that is evident only when
a pair is together. Immature birds show some brown in plumage.
The Black-winged kite is usually seen singly, though many live as pairs. This is
because the two individuals often keep well apart from each other.
They have well defined territories in which there is one or more tall trees to perch
and survey the surroundings. When perched, it is always alert, looking around and cocking
the tail up slowly. It takes to wing periodically, making a slow cruise over the territory
to come back to the same perch or another. The usual flight is slow and leisurely with
heavy wingbeats and some floating. It has a curious habit of hovering to survey the ground
below. To hover, it faces the wind, fans the tail, the wings are raised and continuously
flapped. If prey is spotted, it descends straight down by a parachuting action, which only
the tips of wings moving in a quivering motion to start hovering at a lower level. Prey is
caught by making a dash with a sudden closure of wings and dropping down while the legs
are distented. Sometimes, one may swoop down and grab prey. It feeds on a wide variety of
small creatures such as mice, lizards and insects. Prey is caught by a foot and taken to a
perch to be consumed.
It favours large open areas such as grasslands and plains such as patana and talawa
grasslands. It is not usually met with in jungles but is found in marshes and paddyfields.
It is sometimes seen hunting late into the evening. A pair usually comes together to roost
in the same tree in the evening. In the talawas, it is seen that up to 10 individuals
using the same tree for a roost. Though usually silent, it occasionally utter a shrill
‘’kee-kee’’ call several times in succession while at rest. It is shy
and timid, and has not been seen fighting back against any aggressars but flies away when
threatened.
The breeding season in Sri Lanka is according to G. M. Henry (1971) is between December
to March with a second brood being reared from July to September. W. E. Wait (1930) has
stated that it breeds in the hills from December to March and in the low country from
October to February and again in July. My observations in the Eastern Province and
adjoining areas of Uva show that it breeds mostly after monsoonal rains when food is
abundent but occasional nests are found during other months as well. There are no personal
observations of this bird nesting in the low country wet zone. The nest is an untidy mess
of twigs made on the crown of a tall tree. The eggs number 2 or 3, and according to
literature are white and heavily blotched with brownish red. Both parents tend the eggs
and young. The young are covered with white down.
The Black-winged Kite is distributed widely in the low country wet and dry zones and
throughout the hills upto Horton Plains. It is rare in the low country wet zone and most
of my records are between the months of November to March. According to Wait (1930) it is
partially a migrant, but has not mentioned any more details. This bird too is getting
scarce in many parts of the country. One reason is the loss of habitats. Another more
pressing problem is the proliferation of House Crows which mob and attack this bird. The
small size slow flight and timid nature make it an easy target of crows. This problem
seems to be increasing in many parts of the country, including at Horton Plains. The males
of Pale or Pallid Horrier, another whitish raptor that favours open areas has some
similarity with the Black-winged kite but can be easily identified by being larger with a
more slender build, long narrow wings, the lack of black wings covers (although it has
black wing tips) and a buoyant, sailing flight. The front cover of the Birds of Ceylon
— book 3 by W. W. A. Phillips (1954) show an illustration by Mrs Cicely Lushington
depicting both a Black-winged kite and a male Pale Harrier. The Black-winged kite has a
wide distribution throughout Asia, Africa and some parts of Europe.
LTTE’s
international organisation and operations – a preliminary analysis
By Peter Chalk
Commentary No. 77
(a Canadian Security Intelligence Service publication)
(Continued from tomorrow)
Funds are not always procured directly from the Tamil diaspora. Often the LTTE will siphon
off donations that are given to non-profit cultural bodies to finance Tamil social
service, medical and rehabilitation programs in Sri Lanka. The great advantage of this
form of financial procurement is that it is often extremely difficult to prove that funds
raised for humanitarian purposes are being diverted to propagate terrorism or other forms
of illegal activity elsewhere. This is particularly true in states such as Norway, where
there is not even a legal requirement for individuals to register as an organization
before engaging in fundraising.
There also have been suggestions that the LTTE raised money through drug running,
particularly heroin from Southeast and Southwest Asia. According to a 1995 report by the
Mackenzie Institute, a non-profit research group based in Toronto, the most profitable
LTTE activities have been in the form of heroin trafficking. Sri Lankan officials concur,
with one senior diplomat asserting that "collection of money from Tamil expatriate
sources is insignificant compared to money from narcotics." Certainly, there are
extensive profits to be made from the drug trade. The current cost of a single
"hit" of heroin (less than a gram) in London, for instance, is thought to be
around 10GBP, while the wholesale price of a kilogram sold in New York is estimated to be
at least US$250,000.
Definitive proof linking the LTTE to an official policy of drug running has yet to
materialize. However, a number of analysts have pointed out that the LTTE is in a
particularly advantageous position to traffic narcotics thanks to the highly efficient
international network it has developed to smuggle munitions around the world. Many of
these arms routes pass either directly through, or very close to, major drug producing and
transit centres, including Burma, Thailand, Cambodia, southern China, Afghanistan and
Pakistan.
Moreover, a fair amount of circumstantial evidence exists which suggests at least some
sort of nexus between the LTTE and narcotics operations. The Mackenzie Institute has
documented the arrests, worldwide, of several Tamils with links to militant organizations
for drug running since the early 1980s, including V. Manoharan, the LTTE’s present
International Chief. Indeed after Manoharan signed a petition challenging the US
designation of the LTTE as a terrorist group in 1997, INTERPOL disclosed that he had been
imprisoned in France for two years for possession of heroin. Suspicions that the narcotics
had been traded on behalf of the Tigers were subsequently raised after it was discovered
that Prabhakaran had authorized LTTE France to pay a monthly salary to his family while he
was in jail.
Money collected by LTTE international fundraising efforts forms an integral component
of the organization’s so-called National Defense Fund. Indeed since losing effective
control of the Jaffna peninsula in late 1995/early 1996, it is estimated that as much as
eighty to ninety percent of the group’s war chest comes from overseas. Presently, the
LTTE is believed to be "petitioning" the overseas Tamil diaspora in the UK,
Canada and Australia to contribute up to US$1000 per family in support of the group’s
military campaign to win control of the crucial northern reaches of Highway A9.
It is also through these global financial operations that the LTTE manage to acquire
most of their weaponry and munitions. Sri Lankan agencies are aware, for instance, that
one LTTE member, Dharmakulaseelan, played a key role in a multinational operation that was
active in the early 1990s, where money raised in North America was forwarded to the
Philippines and used to purchase weapons from Southeast Asian arms dealers.
The LTTE international fundraising effort has additionally been used to mount
protracted and expensive legal defenses of the group and its members. This was, perhaps,
best reflected following the arrest in 1995 of Manikavasagam Suresh, the LTTE
representative to Canada) In response, the organization initiated a mass mail-out campaign
stating that the detention of Suresh was politically motivated and represented a direct
attack on the entire Canadian Tamil population. In addition, it organized repeated
demonstrations urging that Suresh’s trial be scrapped and hired two highly paid
lawyers to provide legal counsel under the overall coordination of a prominent New
York-based attorney, Viswanathan Ruthirakumaran-the de facto head of LTTE operations in
the US. This huge effort ensured that the Suresh trial was one of the most keenly
contested in Canadian legal history as far as reviews of security certificates were
concerned.
More recently and acting through Ruthirakumaran, the LTTE hired a top US law firm run
by Ramsey Clark, a former Attorney General in the Lyndon Johnson administration, to fight
Washington’s 1997 decision to label the group as a terrorist organization. Although
the effort subsequently failed, it nevertheless amply demonstrated the LTTE’s ability
to access the very highest echelons of the US legal establishment-no mean feat for a
jungle-based insurgent force located on the other side of the world.
Military and Military-Related Procurement
The third component of the LTTE procurement network revolves around weapons and
munitions acquisition. This is perhaps the most secretive of the group’s
international operations and the one that best demonstrates the organization’s global
reach.
Prior to 1987, the LTTE procured most of its weaponry from four main sources:
Afghanistan, via the Indo-Pakistani border.
Directly from Indian external sources.
Indigenous production.
Munitions captured from the Sri Lankan military.
Following the signing of the Indo-Sri Lankan Peace Accord of 1987, however, the LTTE
lost the benefit of external Indian support. In response, the organization started
carrying out increasingly daring strikes against Sri Lankan military camps and weapons
depots, acquiring most of its long-range artillery directly from Colombo’s armed
forces. In addition, the LTTE stepped up their indigenous weapons production program,
developing a sophisticated short-range missile capability by 1990. Most importantly, at
least from the perspective of this paper, the organization expanded its international arms
procurement network beyond the limited focus on Afghanistan and Pakistan.
The LTTE arms network is headed by Tharmalingam Shanmugham, alias Kumaran Pathmanathan
and colloquially known simply as "KP." Second to Prabhakaran and with a
US$500,000 bounty on his head, Pathmanathan is currently the second most wanted man in Sri
Lanka. With more than twenty passports to his name, and possessing the ability to pass
himself off as any middle-class Tamil, Kumaran travels widely. However, Sri Lankan
intelligence sources believe his main bases to have been Singapore, Rangoon, Bangkok and,
more recently, Johannesburg; he is alleged to have held various bank accounts in London,
Frankfurt, Denmark, Athens, and Australia.
Most members of the LTTE global weapons procurement team, known as the "KP
Department," have received no formal military training, including Kumaran himself.
While not specifically trained in military skills, however, those inducted into the KP
Department receive intensive instruction in a number of other areas including document
forgery, gun running, communication, international freight shipping and investing.
At the heart of the KP Department’s operations is a highly secretive shipping
network. The LTTE started building their maritime network with the help of a Bombay
shipping magnate in the mid 1980s. Today the fleet numbers at least ten freighters, all of
which are equipped with sophisticated radar and Inmarsat communication technology. The
vessels mostly travel under Panamanian, Honduran or Liberian flags (colloquially known as
"Pan-Ho-Lib," these maritime states are all characterized by notoriously lax
registration requirements), tend to be crewed by Tamils originating from the Jaffna
seaport of Velvettiturai and are typically owned by various front companies located in
Asia. The ships frequently visit Japan, Indonesia, Singapore, South Africa, Burma, Turkey,
France, Italy and Ukraine. Some are also heavily armed and have challenged both the Indian
and the Sri Lankan navy when confronted. Ninety five percent of the time the vessels
transport legitimate commercial goods such as hardwood, tea, rice paddy, etc.
Singapore and Hong Kong, strategically situated on key shipping lanes and with highly
developed banking structures, form the communications hub of the LTTE weapons procurement
network. These two "city states" orchestrate cells located in Thailand, Pakistan
and Burma, effectively plugging the LTTE into the booming arms bazaars of Southeast and
Southwest Asia. However the group is also known to have used front companies and
contractors in Africa and Europe for deals involving the states of the former Soviet
Union, the Middle East and sub-Saharan Africa.
More specifically, it is possible to divide LTTE international arms procurement
activity into five main zones of geographic operation:
Northeast and Southeast Asia, focussing particularly on China, North Korea, Cambodia,
Thailand, Hong Kong, Vietnam and Burma.
Southwest Asia, focussing particularly on Afghanistan and Pakistan (through the
so-called "Afghan pipeline").
The Former Soviet Union, focussing particularly on Ukraine.
Southeastern Europe and the Middle East, focussing particularly on Lebanon, Cyprus,
Greece, Bulgaria and Turkey.
Africa, focussing particularly on Nigeria, Zimbabwe and South Africa.
From these various sources, well-established trafficking routes are used to transport
the munitions back to Sri Lanka. Weapons from China, North Korea and Hong Kong are
trafficked across the South China Sea, through the Malacca and Singapore Straits to the
Bay of Bengal and then on to Sri Lanka. Arms from Cambodia, Vietnam and Burma transit
through Thailand before being loaded onto vessels at the southern port of Ranong for the
trip across the Bay of Bengal. Weapons from Eastern Europe, Ukraine and the Middle East
pass through the Suez Canal, around the Horn of Africa and then on to Sri Lanka. Finally,
munitions from Africa tend to be smuggled back to LTTE jungle strongholds either around
the Cape of Good Hope from ports in Liberia, Nigeria and Angola or via Madagascar from the
Mozambican coastal town Beira.
(Continued tomorrow) |
