A law suit has been filed in a court in Colombo against a Sri Lankan-born US business tycoon on charges that he and his father helped the terrorist group, LTTE. The tycoon, a billionaire, Rajaratnam, head of a US hedge fund, is already facing insider trading charges in the US. Rajaratnam [52] was among six persons arrested on Oct 17 on charges of securities fraud and conspiracy to commit securities fraud. Speaking in Parliament, Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama said, the arrest was “a significant development in the area of the LTTE’s financing network”.
The suit filed by 30 victims of attacks by the LTTE alleged that the Galleon Group founder, Raj Rajaratnam, and a family foundation led by his father gave more than $5 million to a US charity that was subsequently declared a front for the LTTE which fought a brutal separatist war against the Sri Lankan Government from 1976 until it was defeated last May. The Tamil Rehabilitation Organisation [TRO] to which Rajaratnam made donations, according to the complaint, coordinated and funded relief activities in early 2005 after a tsunami battered Sri Lanka.
The Sri Lankan Defence Ministry said, the LTTE’s arms procurer and Prabhakaran’s successor, Kumar Pathmanadan, a.k.a. KP, had revealed during interrogation that Rajaratnam had been a leading contributor of money to the LTTE.
Probe charges of war crimes – US tells Colombo
Meanwhile, the US has asked Sri Lanka to thoroughly investigate charges of war crimes allegedly committed both by Government forces and the LTTE militants in the final months of the country’s 25-year civil war. In a 68-page report submitted to the US Congress, the State Department catalogues a whole series of alleged atrocities, terming them “credible”, but making it clear that it has not reached any definitive conclusions on their occurrence or whether they constituted violations of international law. The Sri Lankan Government is really interested in post-war reconciliation. It should investigate the alleged abuses and bring to justice all those responsible for them, the Department said.
If the report cites accounts of the LTTE recruiting children as combatants and using civilians as human shields, it also lists reports of Government forces shelling areas that were deemed to be safe haven for Tamil civilians, killing LTTE cadre trying to surrender and allowing dismal humanitarian conditions to prevail in the camps for the displaced populace.
Rehabilitation of the displaced
The Sri Lankan Government has released 41,685 Tamils belonging to 12,000 families displaced during Eelam War IV and put up since then in government-run relief camps in the north of the country. They are being sent back to their original villages in Vavuniya, Mannar, Kilinochchi and Mullaithivu districts, said a Government official in Colombo on Oct.22.
President Mahinda Rajapaksa had assured the ten-member delegation of Tamil MPs from India, which visited Sri Lanka last week that 58,000 internally-displaced persons [IDPs] in the camps would be sent back to their native places within a fortnight. In a special message for the released IDPs, President Rajapaksa said, in another two weeks, 30,000 to 35,000more displaced in the camps would hopefully be facilitated to return to their original homes.
Prior to the release of 41,685 people, there were in all 2,50,000Tamil refugees in the camps. The Government plans to release the remaining IDPs gradually. Progress on their release is linked to de-mining work, certification by the UN and creation of basic infrastructure for people to return to normal life.
