Dutch Tamils arrested for illegal Tigers fundraising

Tamils in the Netherlands have been forced to donate money to the LTTE, the Tamil separatist army, to pay for its war against Sri Lanka’s government army. Dutch court authorities say the Tigers held these people in ‘a stranglehold’, forcing them to pay a ‘war tax’. The investigation has been going on for two years. Several people have been arrested, including the alleged leader of the Dutch branch of the Tigers.

Reprisals
Court documents, published by Dutch newspaper NRC Handelsblad, say that the Tamil Tigers systematically extorted large sums of money from Dutch Tamils. If they refused, they were threatened with reprisals.

Tens of thousands of Tamils live in the Netherlands. The majority came to the country after the Tamil separatist war broke out in the mid-1980’s. The Tamil Tigers have been listed as a terrorist organisation in EU-countries such as the Netherlands since 2006.

The Netherlands is not the first European country where Tamils have been arrested for money laundering and extortion. Last year, Tamils in Switzerland and the UK were arrested for the same reason. While the Dutch Tamils are still awaiting trial, in the UK and Switzerland several people have already been convicted.

Common
Dr Christopher McDowell of the City University London  has published extensively on the Tamil diaspora in Europe. He told RNW that it used to be very common for Tamil groups to raise funds for the homeland.

"From the early 1980s, hundreds of thousands of Tamils fled Sri Lanka and moved to Europe, the US or East Asia,” he says. “Many of them felt quite guilty because they got out and were safe. Out of this guilt, they were willing to give money to the people who stayed behind."

According to Mr McDowell, most people didn’t overtly pledge money for the military cause. “The LTTE was very effective in promoting humanitarian causes to help their own people,” he says. “A number of these causes were very closely entwined with the LTTE and most people tended to turn a blind eye to that."

Globalisation
The Tamil diaspora has become known for its ability to raise huge funds – with or without criminal intent –  for the people in their homeland. "In the ‘80s you saw a very rapid and sudden movement of Tamils across the globe," Mr McDowell says. "They took advantage of the upcoming globalisation and new technologies to keep the diaspora closely in touch with themselves. They were easy to target."

Defeat
The Tigers’ defeat in 2009 quickly lead to a severe weakening of the organisational structure of the LTTE, including a worldwide power struggle, which has subsequently lead to less money being raised.

"This conflating of crime and political fundraising was particularly nasty. People obviously felt under enormous pressure against threats of physical violence," says Mr McDowell. "But despite the end of the war, fundraising apparently still continues."