Italian newspapers reveal scope of anti-LTTE operation

A clandestine network of the Tigers was collecting money from their fellow countrymen resident in Italy to be destined to the subversive group. Those who refused to pay a certain amount every month risked retaliations against their family members in Sri Lanka, Italian newspapers reported on the arrest of 33 Tiger cadres in that country. The newspapers La Repubblica, Il Corrierr della Sera and Il Massaggero reported extensively on this massive operation conducted throughout Italy.

The report in the La Repubblica: “This is a distant war on which the investigators of the Special Police of Naples coordinated by the Anti-Terrorist Department of the Law Courts have focused their attention. The secrets of the mechanism of financing this war were kept by unsuspected immigrants, all with a regular stay permit and who have been living are working as domestics in Italy for many years.

Thirty Sri Lankan citizens of the Tamil ethnic group have been arrested with the accusation of association finalised to terrorism and extortion.

The operation took place in Naples, Rome, Palermo, Genoa, Bologna, Reggio Emilia, Mantova and Biella. The persons under investigations are accused to be members of the LTTE, the terrorist organisation that has caused so much bloodshed in Sri Lanka during the last 25 years and has provoked the death of over 8,000 civilians. In one year over Euro 3.5 million have been collected to be destined to the Tigers, often by blackmail.

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'LTTE aimed to collect 3.5 million pounds in Italy'

A group of 33 suspected LTTE activists arrested in Italy were engaged in collecting through extortion from ethnic Tamils a whopping 3.5 million pounds for funding the ethnic war in Sri Lanka, the Defence Ministry said here today.

Citing the Italian investigators, it said that the arrested people were "collecting more than 3.5 million British pounds worth of money to be deposited in Swiss Banks to bankroll a war in Sri Lanka." Eight of the suspects were arrested in Naples, 7 in Palermo, 3 in Genoa and the rest elsewhere in Italy, where the money was being collected by the Tigers through illegal activities of extortion and drug sales, the ministry quoted a report as saying.

The Sri Lankan embassy in Rome said it would coordinate with Italian authorities for further investigation into the matter.

According to the Italian police the "anti-terrorist" investigation was launched following a complaint that some Tamils living in Italy were being threatened, about two years ago, the ministry here said.

extracted from,
http://www.ptinews.com/

Italian police arrest 28 suspected Tamil Tigers

Twenty-eight suspected members of Sri Lanka's Tamil Tigers rebel group have been arrested in Italy, anti-terrorist police said on Tuesday.

A police statement said the 28, all from Sri Lanka, were detained in several cities.

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebel movement is fighting for an independent state in the north and east of Sri Lanka.

More details of the operation, which involved about 200 police agents, were expected to be issued later on Wednesday.

Extracted from,
http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSL1862171920080618