TRO collects Rs.60m in August

Shanika Sriyananda

Despite stringent measures to freeze funds of the Tamil Rehabilitation Organisation (TRO) a LTTE front organisation, it has raised over Rs. 60 million in August this year.

Chairman of the Parliamentary Committee appointed to probe the activities of the INGOs and NGOs, JVP MP Vijitha Herath said that out of over Rs. 4 billion raised by the TRO for post tsunami activities, only Rs. 55,000,000 are in its Accounts.

According to Herath, the total amount of post tsunami aid received by the government was Rs. 2.2 billion in 2006 and the amount that obtained by the TRO was over Rs. 4 billion including the aid from the USA.

“They have received US $ 10 million for the post-tsunami activities from the USA in 2006 and most of these funds are from the state of Maryland. At the moment the American authorities are also investigating whether a major portion of their funds have been channelled to the LTTE”, he said.

Though TRO had undertaken to build 15,000 houses, they had built only 300.

Highlighting the need for freezing the existing funds of the remaining TRO branches and prevent channelling money to the Organisation he said that some branches in Canada and other European countries were still active in raising funds. “Though the TRO has direct links with the LTTE, its affiliated organisations such as Action Aid International engage in activities assigned by the TRO”.

According to the Committee findings, the Save the Children had given financial aid amounting Rs. 50 million to the TRO for 12 projects.

“ The Save the Children has given evidence before the Committee and said that the TRO, which only constructed a Pre-school, had refused to return the given Rs. 30 million which was unspent”, Herath said.

Funds released by the Norwegian Organisation for Peace in 2005 include US $ 877,280 for the LTTE’s Peace Secretariat, US $ 2,318,393 for the TRO and US $ 245,750 for the Muslim Peace Secretariat.