Terrorism and Transnational Crime:
The Case of the LTTE

by John Thompson

Paper to the Centre for Conflict Studies Fall Seminar, October 3-4, 2003

Introduction

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) are a fascinating and complex group; and until the 9-11 attacks, I thought them the most dangerous group in the world. This wasnÌt because of lethal intentions, al Qaeda had earlier demonstrated its primacy in this regard, but rather because of the sophistication and organization of their political fronts and fundraising networks.

Their political and criminal activities are -- like their ÎmilitaryÌ arm Ò innovative, daring and resourceful. This is a group that largely restricts its combat activities to Sri Lanka, has only once attacked a Western target, and yet which has established a global network to generate money and political support. It is a group that also owns its own shipping line and is as adept at generating numbered shell corporations as it is at counterfeiting travel documents or conditioning suicide bombers.

One of the clearest examples of the LTTEÌs sophistication comes from the 1997 theft of 32,400 rounds of 81mm mortar ammunition purchased from Tanzania for the Sri Lankan Army. The LTTE was aware of the purchase, made a bid to the Tanzanian manufacturing company through a front company to have one of the TigersÌ own merchant ships handle the delivery. Once the cargo was aboard, the shipÌs name and registration changed out at sea and the bombs were handed over to the LTTEÌs guerrilla forces Ò who then completed the delivery of the mortar bombs, one salvo at a time÷

It is hard to imagine the Red Army Faction or Action Direct operating with this much sophistication and verve.

Outside the Usual Models

There are the two usual patterns for a terrorist group to become involved in organized crime: No doubt these will be discussed later and more expertly here, but I call them Îevolutionary addictionÌ and Îjoint ventureÌ.

The process of evolutionary addiction sees the insurgent slowly become involved in crime as an expedient means to fund his campaign. One might begin with some ÎrevolutionaryÌ bank robbing, or kidnapping for ransom. Later on, the involvement becomes more intense and comprehensive until a transformation is worked wherein crime is as important as the armed struggle, and on to the point where the armed struggle is used to justify involvement in criminal enterprises. Eventually, the group becomes entirely criminal. Sometimes, this transformation takes a couple of generations; sometimes it happens in less than a decade Ò witness the history of the Mohawk Warriors Society, where the once-idealistic defenders of Mohawk sovereignty of 1980 had become ÎbuttleggingÌ casino goons by 1990.

The joint venture comes into play when the insurgent and the gangster each realize that they can be of use to each other Ò often for only a limited time and circumstances. As an example, one might think of the cooperation of the PLO, the Christian Phalange and Sicilian Mafias in a series of bank robberies in Lebanon at the start of the Civil War there. However, for this cooperation to work, there already has to be some predilection for crime among the insurgents anyway.

Neither model applies to the LTTE.

The vast majority of Sri Lankan Tamils are Hindus, and in a Hindu society, the caste and place of oneÌs birth can often mean that oneÌs path through life is already shaped. In the case of Villupillai Prabhakaran and his closest associates in 1973, they had been born to a village of members of the fisherman caste. This might mean that they could actually have leaned to catch fish for a living, but Ò in this part of Sri LankaÒ the traditional activities of the FishermanÌs Caste involve smuggling and collecting kappan (extortion) money.

In short, the founders of the LTTE were petty criminals. It was after this that they became interested in creating an insurgent movement.

As an aside, issues of caste still seem to be important to Prabhakaran. Some LTTE website contents infer that instead of being lowly fishermen, the Sri Lankan Tamils are really all from the much more prestigious warrior caste, but that the British, apparently jealous of Tamil martial prowess suppressed this knowledge. This is an item that seems to have escaped all historical notice, not that such a consideration has ever been an obstruction to a good conspiracy theory.

Additionally, like all good insurgents, the LTTE began by eliminating prospective rival insurgent groups and suppressing moderate perspectives in the Tamil community. However, a special degree of ruthlessness was reserved for captured Tamil guerrillas from PLOTE (the Popular Liberation Organization of Tamil Eelam) whose leader had pointedly raised the issue of PrabhakaranÌs low caste.

As a Kappan collector, the young Prabhakaran would have had to cultivate a reputation for brutality and ruthlessness Ò a reputation that was certainly enhanced in Jaffna in 1975, when he committed the LTTEÌs first violent political action by assassinating a moderate Tamil, the mayor of the city in 1975.

The Narcotics Windfall

The LTTE funded itself in the 1970s, largely by continuing to engage in smuggling and extortion. It remained a modest group and was not the threat that it would later become. Things changed in 1979. The Iranian Revolution and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan caused considerable disruption in the usual smuggling routes for opium and heroin from south-central Asia. The LTTE, already well versed in smuggling techniques in the Indian Ocean, were able to offer new alternatives. The results were dramatic.

By 1983, the LTTE was large enough to simultaneously begin conventional guerrilla operations against the Sri Lankan army, and to move on its rival Sri Lankan Tamil insurgent groups. It was soon the largest and best-armed force in the north of the Country and has been able to maintain inviolate sanctuary areas ever since.

By 1984, European police were reporting a significant Tamil presence. The Swiss estimated that Tamil refugees were responsible for some 20% of the narcotics entering their country. The Italian prison system had over 200 Tamil heroin smugglers and traffickers, many of who were attempting to claim special status as political prisoners and Îrevolutionary fightersÌ. Some of the prisoners who had been deemed as being too talkative by their peers had their tongues cut out in prison.

The LTTE still moves narcotics, and the rotating names and registrations of the TigerÌs own shipping line makes interdiction more difficult. Another pipeline in the 1980s ran through the Soviet Bloc, suggesting that the Tamils were already becoming involved with Soviet officials.

The LTTE is not alone in moving narcotics. FARC, Hizbollah, the PKK and others all do the same; and the Tigers by no means have exclusive control over heroin shipping. But they do handle the drug from both south central and south east Asia.

Tamil Heroin dealers have been in Canada since 1984, but nobody can (nor probably ever will) directly tie narcotics trafficking to their major political fronts here. Most of the business appears to be in the hands of two street gangs, AK Kanon (which has little direct sympathy for the LTTE) and VVT (which openly aligns itself with the Tiger cause). The violence between the two gangs has embarrassed the Tiger leadership in Canada, and causes considerable dismay within the Tamil community.

Some other heroin traffickers in Canada had proven to be unusual. One, imprisoned in a federal facility in Ontario, had still managed to get confederates outside of the prison system to prepare an escape with a heavily armed helicopter. However, the plan was called off not so much because it was ambitious, but because it would have caused too much alarm among Canadian authorities.

The People Pipeline

There is a long history of insurgent groups and organized crime networks using communities of expatriates from their homeland as a shelter, market and shield from authority within Western nations. One can think of the 19th Century Irish Nationalists in the United States, or the communities of Russian Socialists throughout Western Europe at the start of the 20th Century.

What makes the LTTE unusual is not that they use the ÎDiasporaÌ community of Sri Lankan Tamils, so much as it is that they deliberately facilitated the creation of that community in the first place.

The start of major guerrilla operations in 1983 (and the resulting heavy-handed response by the Sri Lankan Army and Sinhalese mobs) resulted in the internal displacement of hundreds of thousands of Sri Lankan Tamils Ò many of them talented and innovative people. The LTTE was already expert in the techniques of raising money from its own community, but the refugees who fled to their sanctuary areas were able to generate little income for the cause. Prabhakaran realized that, if these refugees could find new homes in the Western World, they could contribute much more on a regular basis.

The resulting Diaspora has taken full advantage of Western immigration laws and social support systems, to move over 500,000 Sri Lankan Tamils in twenty years into Australia, Britain, Canada France, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, and the United States. It says much that between 40-50% of this population has moved into Canada. Traditionally, Jaffna had been the centre of Sri Lankan Tamil culture and had been their largest city. With something like 180,000 to 200,000 Sri Lankan Tamils now living in Toronto, Canada is hosting the largest Sri Lankan Tamil city in the world.

The LTTE makes money from this process in several ways. Firstly, Tamils living in LTTE controlled areas inside Sri Lanka can be tapped for an Ïexit visaÓ, particularly if the departing family member has not yet served within the LTTEÌs various guerrilla forces.

Once abroad, the Tamil family can be tapped for Ïwar taxesÓ. These are a regular monthly payment, and usually start around $30 dollars per household for families on social assistance in the Western World. More will be expected later once professional careers and businesses have been established. The system began in Britain in 1983 and has spread to other Western nations.

One ring in the Ruhr area of Germany was found to have raised an estimated $1.9 Billion over five years before being shut down in 1999. (This amount seems excessive to the author, but it may be that they were channeling money from other centres, and perhaps from narcotics). In 1996, Toronto police estimated that $1 million a month was being raised in their city through the contribution system Ò but the figure could easily have been double that.

The war tax system is backed by a threat of coercion, but most families pay willingly enough Ò save when a heavy fundraising drive is underway. One such drive occurred just after the LTTE lost Jaffna to the Sri Lankan Army in 1995, when some Toronto families and businesses complained that they were expected to contribute an additional $1,000 to the cause.

Tamils who have attempted to evade paying the war tax system have sometimes found that, if they send money to their families back on Sri Lanka, local LTTE organizers soon find out about it and persuade the family to give up the address of the missing contributor overseas. Shortly afterwards, the deficient contributor can expect to be reminded of his obligations and make good on arrears. This degree of organization and communication suggests that an effective international administration system exists among the Diaspora Community with many links back to Sri Lanka.

The other money-maker associated with the Diaspora lies with people smuggling and its related demand for counterfeit travel documents. In 1985, when the first large arrival of Sri Lankan Tamils paddled ashore on Nova Scotia, they tried to give the impression they had been shipped over directly from Sri Lanka, and that Canada was their first country of refuge. Actually, their route (and this was during the Cold War) lay through India, the USSR, East Germany, and then into West Germany where they found some of the questions of the local authorities to be too awkward. Then they went on to Canada by ship. Meanwhile, in Hamburg, a fire conveniently broke out in the police archive that had records on many aspects of their trip and stay in Germany. The second mass arrival of Sri Lankan Tamils (again by boat) saw many of them trying to persuade unconvinced Canadian Immigration Officers that they were actually Sikhs.

In any event, almost all of the Tamils were admitted to Canada as refugees, and more followed. The majority came as conventional immigrants (often under family reunification provisions), but thousands more came every year as refugee claimants and undocumented refugee applicants. The usual tactic since the mid-1980s has been to travel in small groups with fraudulent documentation under the aegis of a professional people smuggler.

The Sri Lankan people smugglers are not members of the LTTE, but many appear to have been closely affiliated with the guerrillas and some Sri Lankan officials believe they are ÎenfranchisedÌ to attract clientele among Sri Lankan Tamils, with a share of the proceeds going the Tigers. They also work at lower rates ($10-$40,000 per head) then is usual for arranging entry into Canada Ò people smugglers from other backgrounds normally charge $20-70,000 per head.

Fraudulent travel documents are necessary for people smuggling; and the Sri Lankan Tamils have some excellent counterfeiters working for them. Several rings have been uncovered in Canada, producing high-quality counterfoil pages for Canadian passports, phony Citizenship Cards and OHIP Cards. It also says much that, apparently, the chief arms purchaser for the LTTE travels internationally with a Canadian passport Ò despite the fact that he is not a citizen here, and may never have even visited Canada.

Counterfeiting can be turned to other functions as well.

Other Activities

The LTTE does not neglect other opportunities for fundraising. Like other Terrorist groups, they will turn to the creation of counterfeit credit and ATM cards. One gas station operation in Toronto was one of the most sophisticated set-ups to capture PIN numbers and data that local police had ever seen. Besides the usual ÏCC-GrabbersÓ latched on to the card readers, a set of pinhole cameras would capture the PIN numbers as consumers used the cards, which were then transmitted wirelessly to video recorders concealed in one of the employeesÌ cars. When arrested, the ring was preparing $20 million worth of counterfeit cards.

Counterfeiting also plays a role in consumer and bank fraud undertaken by members of the Canadian Tamil community. There is some reason to suspect that there is involvement in prostitution, and one Toronto area madam is reputed to pass information to the LTTEÌs fundraisers about her customers. Apparently, a man who can afford a few hundred dollars for some negotiable affection can afford to pay more war-taxes, particularly if he doesnÌt want friends and families to know about his dalliances.

It is a long-standing policy of the LTTE to restrict lethal violence to Sri Lanka (and occasionally to southern India) and to never attack Westerners. Not withstanding the violence between Tamil street gangs in Toronto, there are no reports of bank robberies, muggings, or other forms of armed robbery in Canada or elsewhere in the Diaspora community.

One last point deserves to be made: The scale and sophistication of the LTTEÌs criminal enterprises are a dangerous template Ò as indeed are the parallel political fronts that the organization maintains in several countries. While the Tigers are not a direct threat to Canadian interests, and have never engaged in any violence here outside of their own community, we might not be so lucky with the first group to copy their model.

John Thompson is President of the Mackenzie Institute which studies political instability and terrorism. He can be reached at: mackenzieinstitute@bellnet.ca