A Culture of Fear: LTTE Intimidation, Threats, and Violence
Part Three of the Human Rights Watch Report on LTTE
extortion of Tamil Diaspora
The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam subject Sri Lankan Tamils living
in Canada, the United Kingdom and other Western countries to
intimidation, extortion and even violence to ensure a steady flow of
funds for operations in Sri Lanka and to suppress criticism of human
rights abuses, said Human Rights Watch in a new report released Tuesday.
The 45-page report, Funding the 'Final War:' LTTE Intimidation and
Extortion in the Tamil Diaspora, details how representatives of the LTTE
and pro-LTTE groups use unlawful pressure among Tamil communities in the
West to secure financial pledges. The Daily News is serialising the
report.
REPORT: A history of LTTE violence in both Sri Lanka and the West has
created a climate of fear for many within the Tamil diaspora,
discouraging statements, activities, or even social interactions that
may be perceived as critical of the LTTE.
Many members of the Tamil community closely follow events in Sri
Lanka's North and East, where the LTTE has systematically assassinated
perceived Tamil rivals not only during the war, but also throughout the
four-year ceasefire.
As noted above, since the beginning of the ceasefire, over 200
people, mostly Tamil, have been killed apparently for political reasons,
mainly at the hands of the LTTE.
Those killed included teachers, journalists, individuals linked with
opposition parties, and others perceived as critical of the LTTE. Some
apparently have been killed solely for working in educational, social or
religious programs funded by the Government.
For many Tamils in the West with family members remaining in Sri
Lanka, the message was that any act of disloyalty may result in death.
Tamils in the West have been subject to death threats, beatings,
property damage, smear campaigns, fabricated criminal charges, and even
murder as a consequence of dissent.
Although incidents of actual violence have been relatively rare, they
reverberate strongly within the community and effectively discourage
others from expressing views that counter the LTTE.
In November 2005, a German Tamil named Vaithiyanathan Loganathan was
attacked and severely beaten after he and several other German Tamils
organised a memorial event in Dusseldorf for the former principal of
Central College, a large and prominent school in Jaffna.
The principal, Kanakapathy Rajadurai, known to oppose the LTTE's
recruitment of children, was shot and killed at his school on October
12, 2005. The organisers of the German memorial event were all former
students at the college. Loganathan had also taught there from 1979 to
1982.
Prior to the memorial, Loganathan's fellow organizers received as
many as five or six threatening phone calls per day.
Fearing a disturbance at the event, the organisers approached the
local police, who sent several uniformed officers to monitor it.
Loganathan chaired the event and gave a tribute to Rajadurai.
He condemned those responsible for his death, but did not attribute
the killing to any particular group. At least one other speaker at the
memorial, however, alleged that the LTTE was responsible.
The event itself went smoothly, but afterwards Loganathan's fellow
organisers again received threatening telephone calls. On November 12, a
week after the event, Loganathan was assaulted when he went to pick up
his wife from her shop in nearby Essen.
He was attacked from behind by two men who pushed him to the ground
and beat his head repeatedly with glass bottles. A third man beat his
right leg with an iron bar. The attackers made no effort to take his
money or other valuables. They ran away after patrons of a restaurant
next door shouted and called the police.
Loganathan suffered two fractures in his right leg, lost several
teeth, and required thirteen stitches on his head. He was hospitalized
for three days, required extensive physical therapy, and two months
after the attack still had not returned to work.
He told Human Rights Watch, I believe that if the people in the
neighbourhood hadn't seen the attack and called for help, I probably
would have died that day.
Witnesses described the assailants as two white men and one
dark-skinned man. A few days after the attack an LTTE-linked Tamil
website, Webeelam.com, stated that it had received a telephone call from
a pro-LTTE group, Anniyan Padai, claiming responsibility for the
assault.
According to Webeelam.com the caller said, We have already taught
Loganathan a lesson and the next person we target will be a woman.
Speaking to us two months after the assault, Loganathan said, Over
the last decade and a half, there have been many incidents like this,
mainly against people who attempt to put any ideas against the LTTE or
criticism against the LTTE... so periodically, there are these attacks
to keep the community quiet. Fear is always there that there is a death
threat hanging over me.
This meeting was a memorial meeting. I can't give up my right to
express myself, my freedom of expression. For example, now I might go on
the radio to express my views or I might speak at a cultural event. This
would be considered against them [LTTE] . . . So the fear of another
attack is very present.
Diaspora journalists have learned that publishing or broadcasting
information that is critical of the LTTE can carry a heavy price.
In the mid-1990s, prominent Tamil journalist DBS Jeyaraj published
Muncharie, an independent Tamil weekly in Toronto that carried news and
features related to events in Sri Lanka and the Tamil community in the
West.
As the Sri Lankan army began to make advances against the LTTE in Sri
Lanka, the paper reported the LTTE's defeats, while other Tamil
newspapers portrayed LTTE operations in a more favourable light.
As a result of his coverage, Jeyaraj began to receive systematic,
threatening phone calls on a daily basis. In November 1995 he received
thirty-seven abusive calls in a single day.
When he continued to publish critical accounts of LTTE losses, pro-LTTE
operatives began to target Jeyaraj's advertisers and the Tamil shops
that carried his paper.
In one instance, pro-LTTE operatives visited ten to fifteen shops
that carried the paper, seized copies of the paper, and dumped them.
Losing circulation and advertising revenue, Jeyaraj was forced to stop
publishing the paper in 1995.
In February 1993, in an incident that is widely known in the Tamil
community, four individuals attacked Jeyaraj in a car parking lot after
he attended a movie with his wife.
The assailants beat Jeyaraj with baseball bats, and broke both of his
legs. Although he reported the incident to the police, and Jeyaraj had
information about the identity of his assailants, no one was ever
arrested for the crime.
Even after thirteen years, the attack on Jeyaraj continues to have a
chilling effect on Tamil journalism in the West. Journalists who are
encouraged to report LTTE abuses reply, Do you want me to end up like
Jeyeraj?
Dissidents often cite Jeyeraj's experiences as a reason why many
members of the community dare not express views that challenge the LTTE.
Another incident frequently cited by Tamils is the 1994 murder of
Sabaratnam Sabalingam in Paris. Sabalingam was reportedly preparing to
publish an anti-LTTE book, based on his acquaintance with LTTE leader
Vellupillai Prabhakaran, when he was shot and killed execution-style in
front of his family.
Suspects in the murder - two trained Tiger militants - were
identified but never charged, reportedly because witnesses were not
willing to testify.
Threats against independent Tamil journalists continue. Newspaper
publishers have been pressured to drop the writers of articles perceived
to be critical of the LTTE. Individual journalists told Human Rights
Watch that they received threatening phone calls.
An LTTE supporter reportedly told one Tamil journalist, If you don't
support the LTTE cause in your newspaper, we will deal with you.
In October 2005, an Australian group linked to the LTTE issued death
threats against Selliah Nagarajah, a political columnist and law
lecturer at the University of Western Australia.
The group, Ellalan Padai, reportedly distributed handbills at a Hindu
temple in Melbourne warning Nagarajah to stop writing about the LTTE,
and stated, This is our final warning.
The same month Nagarajah received a letter warning, Your writing will
end up in your death. This is the time to weed out traitors; very soon
the Tamil world and your friends will know of your death; this will
teach a lesson to other traitors.
Staff and volunteers at the London-based Tamil Broadcasting
Corporation (TBC) have been particular targets. The TBC is an
independent radio station that regularly broadcasts programs that are
critical of LTTE abuses.
TBC's programme director, V. Ramaraj, has received repeated death
threats, and volunteers at the station regularly receive abusive and
threatening telephone calls.
One volunteer who participates in a weekly TBC program told Human
Rights Watch in November 2005, When I started helping TBC, I started to
get calls.
They threatened my wife, told her I should stop helping the TBC, and
told her that the TBC is traitorous radio. He said that some calls
threatened harm if he returned to the North of Sri Lanka.
He said that in August 2005, one caller told him, They will put you
behind bars, you are a traitor, you will be killed.
In late 2005, the volunteer's wife received an e-mail message telling
her that her husband should stop going to the TBC. You have three
children, tell your husband to get out of it, otherwise you will become
a widow.
In July 2004, a caller to TBC threatened to bomb the radio station.
In May 2005, intruders broke into TBC's London offices, damaging
property and stealing broadcasting equipment.
Although the London Metropolitan police investigated the incident, no
one was charged with the crime. The TBC is run nearly entirely through
voluntary contributions from the Tamil community.
A representative remarked, We can't run commercially. If people
advertise with us, they get intimidated, get visits. So we can't get any
commercials.
Tamil activists in both the U.K. and Canada have been subjected to
smear campaigns for speaking out against LTTE abuses or organising
events independent of the LTTE.
The volunteer with TBC mentioned above said that at a social function
in late 2005, he learned that rumours were spreading in the Tamil
community that he was receiving money from the Indian secret service.
He said, They are talking about me in London, spreading stories that
I am a traitor. I came to help TBC to expose the truth and see fairness.
I feel like I have to help, but they are projecting it like I am doing
something wrong.
In December 2005, Seyed Bazeer, a U.K.-based lawyer, was accused by
an LTTE-associated website of being linked to Al-Qaeda after he had
spoken publicly against LTTE killings of Muslims in Eastern Sri Lanka.
The website, Nitharsanam, claimed that Bazeer, a Tamil-speaking
Muslim, was the U.K. representative of the Sri Lankan arm of Al-Qaeda,
and was known to incite violence by spreading Osama Bin Laden's jihad
theology and ideology.
The site published a photo of Bazeer and urged U.K. government action
to curb the activities of such individuals.
Members of the Tamil diaspora are justifiably concerned when they are
targeted on LTTE-linked websites. Just two months before the accusations
against Bazeer, Nitharsanam published a reference to K. Rajadurai, the
principal of Central College in Jaffna, stating that his corpse would be
found soon with a name board around his neck. Rajadurai was shot and
killed at his school shortly afterwards (see above).
In October 2005, Toronto police arrested a Tamil community leader,
Namu Ponnambalam, after an LTTE supporter falsely accused him of
assault.
In late September Ponnambalam had helped to organize and had chaired
a public meeting featuring V. Anandasangari, the leader of the Tamil
United Liberation Front, a political party in Sri Lanka.
A week later, at an October memorial for assassinated Sri Lankan
foreign minister Lakshman Kadirgamar, a member of the audience claimed
that Ponnambalam and several others had threatened and physically
attacked him at the previous week's event.
Ponnambalam was arrested by police, handcuffed, and taken to a
Toronto police station where he was questioned.
He was released within a few hours when it became apparent that the
accusations were without foundation. However, the details of his arrest
were published in Eellanadu, a prominent Tamil newspaper in Toronto.
Ponnambalam believes that the publicity the newspaper gave to the
incident was a deliberate attempt to intimidate him and members of his
family and to damage his reputation.
The LTTE and its supporters often use family members both in the West
and in Sri Lanka to convey warnings to dissidents.
In Toronto, one activist received a telephone call from a relative
saying that an LTTE representative had warned that If you are not going
to control yourself, they will take care of you. A London activist who
criticised the LTTE on a radio programme was later contacted by his
brother in Sri Lanka.
The brother had been invited to a colleague's home, where he was met
by two LTTE members. The LTTE reportedly told him, Your brother should
shut up; otherwise it is not good for him.
The colleague later admitted that he had invited the brother to his
home under explicit instructions from the LTTE. The London activist
said, My brother is very worried about his own family.
In many cases, overt or even implicit threats are not necessary to
silence LTTE critics. Well-known incidents of killings, assaults,
threats, and targeting have prompted members of the Tamil diaspora to
police themselves.
Relatives often discourage family members from speaking out, worried
about possible repercussions, including to family members in Sri Lanka.
Continued political killings attributed to the LTTE in Sri Lanka have
convinced many Tamils that anyone could be at risk.
One Toronto man involved in a cultural organization that has been
repeatedly identified as anti-LTTE in the Tamil media described the
impact of the LTTE's control over the Tamil community: Canada is not
actually a democracy because we can't even open our mouths against the
LTTE.
People are scared to open their mouths. Only a small minority are
willing to open their mouths and do some small, small work. In London, a
Tamil man who said he was once a strong supporter of the LTTE told us:
Personally, I supported the LTTE.
Ninety percent of our people support them. Most of the people are
behind them, even if you don't take the gun, we support them. But later
on, things change and certain groups are targeted.
Whoever questions them. We can see their behaviour. Whoever asks
questions about their activities, they don't let them live.
You don't have any freedom of speech. I was very quiet for some time,
having family in Sri Lanka, so I kept within limits. I didn't want to
expose myself. I can see by experiences that if I do anything, there is
a lot of reaction. . . . I am concerned about my life and my family. The
community is very scared.
A Toronto Tamil who was once targeted for her activity in a
multicultural organization, said, I used to openly say how I feel, but
now am very careful. People who are open get targeted, so their work is
very short. You start something, you want to work for human rights, you
want to make changes, but the space is very limited. |