The Dutch judiciary says that Tamil Tiger leaders in the Netherlands have played a prominent role in financing the civil war in Sri Lanka. The 10,000 Tamils in the Netherlands, police say, were under the iron grip of the guerilla group. (part 1)

Marcel Haenen (NRC Handelsblad)

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) waged a bloody war for a quarter of a century in Sri Lanka, but on May 17th, 2009, it admitted defeat to the country’s majority Sinhalese regime. Tamil Tiger founder and chairman Velupillai Prabhakaran died the following day, killed while he attempted a desperate escape from the battlefield in an ambulance. Meanwhile, some 8,300 km north of that battleground, Tamil Tiger representatives in places like Schagen, The Hague, Breda, Zeist, Raalte and Ammerzoden had yet to capitulate. Their struggle for a Tamil homeland continued. The Dutch police said that until their arrest in 2010, the Dutch Tamils had remained active in raising funds and organising meetings to gather support for their struggle and liberation organisation.

This came to light through digital information obtained from Ramachandran S., 52, a Dutch Tamil from Schagen who was arrested in April last year. He had ‘plans for financial activities’ in his possession, which called for continued fundraising to support the remaining LTTE warriors hidden in the jungles of northern Sri Lanka. For that purpose, a new fund was supposed to be set up under Ramachandran’s supervision, according to a judicial report on the investigation.

Operation Koninck
The investigation into possible criminal activities by the Tigers in the Netherlands has been ongoing for the past two years under the code name ‘Operation Koninck.’ The criminal investigation department has so far identified 38 Tamils and five legal entities as suspects. They are under suspicion for financially supporting or taking part in a criminal organisation. The LTTE was placed on a European Union list of terrorist organisations. According to the judiciary, the LTTE has been responsible for a reign of terror in northern Sri Lanka. It has carried out numerous bomb attacks and assassinations. The Tigers murdered former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1991 and Sri Lankan President Ranasinghe Premadasa two years later. The United Nations and UNICEF have also accused the Tigers of recruiting child soldiers.

Ramachandran is one of the two Dutch Tamils detained for 13 months. According to the judiciary, he is one of the international leaders of the organisation. The Dutch officials say that he ranks high within the LTTE and has been responsible for large sums of money coming through from the Netherlands, which has subsequently been used to buy arms. It is assumed that Ramachandran oversaw a flow of money worth some EUR136 million worldwide, according to an analysis by the fiscal investigative body Fiod, based on information obtained from a USB stick found in his home.

Dutch authorities also say that Ramachandran organised the money flow. Messengers with cash are sent to countries where purchases can be made. Money was being transferred, and sometimes LTTE money in a certain country would be used to buy jewellery, which in turn would be resold elsewhere. The bookkeeping was meticulous, with even the travel costs of the suspects neatly written down, as were the salaries received by the two main suspects from the LTTE. Rent and insurance were also reimbursed.

Battlefield

Another Tamil detainee, locked up since last year, is 46-year-old Srirangam R. from The Hague, who is believed to be the leader of the Tamil Tigers’s Dutch division. This man, like a number of other suspects, fled from Sri Lanka to the Netherlands two decades ago. The Dutch public prosecutor’s office suspects him of being instrumental in a number of functions, including fundraising and propaganda.

In cooperation with Sri Lankan colleagues, the Dutch investigative team was able to inspect Tamil Tiger documents which were seized by the Sri Lankan military in areas which had been under LTTE control until 2009. Among those documents was a form filled out by Ramachandran in 2003, saying that he was responsible for LTTE activities in the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg. He wrote on the form that he had been active in the organisation since 1989, and that he had also worked in other countries. The documents were created when LTTE representatives from abroad met each other in Sri Lanka.

“By going to the battlefield and visiting the warriors, I realised how many obstacles and how much grief these people have to endure while they sacrifice themselves in a life of combat. This has formed and stimulated us even more,” Srirangam wrote about the meeting in 2003. The text had been translated from the Tamil language. Almost all the Tiger suspects speak little Dutch although they have lived in the Netherlands for many years.

Espionage
'Operation Koninck' started in 2009 after a report by the Dutch intelligence and security bureau AIVD. For years the AIVD, in cooperation with intelligence services from other countries, investigated the overseas activities of the LTTE representatives. Criminal investigations into Tamil Tiger activists are also ongoing in countries such as Canada, Australia, the UK, France and Italy. The AIVD reported on extortion practices by Tamils in the Netherlands to the Dutch judiciary in October 2008.

The Dutch public prosecution office suspects that LTTE has organised fundraising activities in the country since 1984. The LTTE held the Tamil community in the Netherlands, numbering some 10,000 people, in its iron grip, according to the Dutch authorities. Detailed records were seized from the suspects, listing all the Tamil families in the Netherlands, complete with specific codes identifying each of them. The Tigers knew how much these people earned, and in turn they had to donate money to the Tigers according to their income.

Donations are raised during sporting events, fairs, lotteries and demonstrations. The Tigers also make house calls to Dutch Tamils. Since 2005, the Tamil Tigers in many countries started organising large fundraising activities for their ‘ultimate war’ which would lead to a free Tamil state. In the Netherlands, the Tigers demanded a donation of EUR2,000 from each Tamil family. People who have given their donation would get a specific number which can then be shown to guards on the borders of Tamil territory, and this would be used as an entrance code. Those who refuse to pay, Dutch authorities say, would be threatened: not paying the so-called war tax would have consequences for family members in Sri Lanka.

According to Dutch investigation, the LTTE in the Netherlands is divided into seven districts. Each district head is responsible for fundraising for the organisation’s war funds. It is believed that the Tigers have set up a number of dummy organisations which hand over money to the LTTE. These organisations include the Tamil Coordinating Committee (TCC), the Tamil Rehabilitation Organisation (TRO), the Tamil Youth Organisation (TYO), the Tamil women’s organisation TVO, and the Tamil Dutch art and cultural organisation TKCO.