U.S. FEDERAL JURY CONVICTS LTTE TERRORIST WEAPONS MERCHANT

A Baltimore federal court jury Monday convicted a Singapore man of attempting to sell arms to the terrorist group Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in Sri Lanka. Four co-conspirators have pleaded guilty in the case. Reuters reported that Balraj Naidu, 48, was charged in a conspiracy to provide material support to the LTTE, which in 1997 was designated by the U.S. Department of State as a foreign terrorist organization. It fought and lost a 26-year-long conflict against the Government of Sri Lanka. According to evidence presented at his trial, Naidu and four co-conspirators arranged to buy some 28 tons of U.S.-made weapons and ammunition from an undercover business in Maryland, Reuters said. LTTE representatives made a $250,000 down-payment on the $900,000 weapons deal with the bogus company in the summer of 2006, the Justice Department said.

Naidu’s partners were arrested in September 2006, after inspecting the weapons that had been delivered to Guam and making another payment of $450,000 to the undercover business, the Justice Department said. Naidu was arrested after a further investigation, it said.

Reuters reported that U.S. officials said the group also had tried to buy weapons from China, Thailand, North Korea, the Philippines and Indonesia for the LTTE to be used against Sri Lankan government forces.

Naidu faces a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison.

The co-conspirators: Thirunavukarasu Varatharasa, 40, of Sri Lanka; Haji Subandi, 73, and retired Indonesian Marine Corps General Erick Wotulo, 62, both Indonesians; and Haniffa Bin Osman, 59, of Singapore, all pleaded guilty and were sentenced to 57 months, 37 months, 30 months and 37 months in prison, respectively.