Feeding the Tiger - how Sri Lankan insurgents fund their war

Jane's Intelligence Review- By: Omar Karmi

The ethnic separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) is the only known insurgent organisation with its own army, navy and now even a rudimentary air force. With the group having undertaken three air strikes since March this year, the LTTE has shown that it has access to financial resources and weapons that not only prolong its campaign, but also give it the luxury of introducing bold, new dimensions to the conflict.

While the LTTE's force presence the Sea Tigers, Air Tigers and various land forces is mainly in the northern and eastern parts of Sri Lanka, the organisation fulfils its financial and procurement needs abroad. Far from the primary theatre of conflict, the LTTE depends on a complex global network of professional managers and outsourced people who acquire money and guns in countries with significant Tamil diaspora communities. Irrespective of the correlation between the LTTE's financial situation and the longevity of a conflict that has cost more than 60,000 lives, the activities of the LTTE abroad - including extortion, narcotics trafficking and credit card fraud - have a negative impact on the countries and societies that host its presence.

Through its licit and illicit businesses and fronts, the Tamil Tigers generate an estimated USD200 to 300 million per year. After accounting for its estimated USD8 million per year of costs within LTTE-administered Sri Lanka, the profit margin of its operating budget would likely be the envy of any multinational corporation.

The Tamil Tiger' financial and procurement structure is well organised and strategically positioned around the globe. Unlike the decentralised jihadist movement, the LTTE is a centralised, hierarchical organisation commanded and controlled by its founding leader, Velupillai Prabhakaran. LTTE loyalists tend to fill the ranks of the two principal directorates that manage the interlocking aims of raising money and buying weapons. However, lower down the chain of command LTTE members tend to act as outsourced agents driven as much by profit as any ideological commitment to creating a Tamil state in Sri Lanka.

The two overarching financial and procurement bodies are the Aiyanna Group, directed by Pottu Amman, and the Office of Overseas Purchases, directed by Kumaran Pathmanathan, alias KP, and source of the office's nickname, the KP Department. Both men have extant Interpol Red Notices listed against them.

The Aiyanna Group functions as the Tamil Tiger' clandestine intelligence and operations body, and likely to be responsible for monitoring and ensuring the organisation's financial support and revenue streams. The Aiyanna Group's global management allegedly acts as overseer among Tamil communities in Western countries through LTTE front organisations.

The Office of Overseas Purchases or KP Department is most probably the LTTE's procurement arm. Although Vaithilingam Sornalingam, alias Colonel Shankar, created the unit (the now-deceased Canadian Tamil who also founded the LTT's Air and Sea Tiger wings), KP allegedly directs its activities at present. The second most-wanted man in Sri Lanka, Pathmanathan is a highly competent and elusive operative. The KP Department has reportedly sourced arms in various countries and operates a fleet of deep-sea vessels, known as the Sea Pigeons. Normally registered in Panama, Honduras or Liberia, the Sea Pigeons are primarily tasked with the delivery of procured weapons to LTTE bases in Sri Lanka and may also be in other LTTE enterprises, legal or otherwise.

The Aiyanna Group and KP Department cadres are strategically placed internationally to correspond closely to Sri Lankan Tamil enclaves, which provide the main source of LTTE money, manpower and weapons. The geographical distribution of Tamil communities enables the LTTE to use them as networked operations centres.