TERRORISM EXPERT PETER CHALK SAYS CANADA’S INTENTION TO FIGHT GLOBAL TERRORISM CANNOT BE SERIOUS IF LTTE IS NOT BANNED
By Walter Jayawardhana reporting from Los Angeles
September 14.12.00 PM:International terrorist expert and advisor to the Canadian Security Intelligence service Peter Chalk, warned Canada that the country was providing a false cover of a legitimacy to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), notorious for suicide bombs, car bombs and assassination squads, by not banning it.
He was quoted by Ottawa Citizen as saying the country was providing a “veneer of legitimacy” to the to the terrorist activities of the Tamil Tigers by failing to outlaw the group as the United States , Britain and Australia had done.
Giving a telephone interview from Singapore to the Ottawa Citizens’s Robert Fife , Peter Chalk who is also an expert at the Rand Corporation said Canada’s strategic importance to the Tamil Tigers, to raiise illegal funds, recruit terrorists and gain political legitimacy increased significantly after Britain and Australia recently joined Washington’s lead in banning its activities.
Chalk said, "It is basically able to carry out its activities in a largely unrestricted fashion in Canada both symbolically and practically for its logistical designs.”
Canada’s equivalent of the CIA, CSIS recently asked Canada’s Federal government to ban the LTTE as a terrorist group, but Foreign Affairs Minister Bill Graham under pressure from Liberal Party politicians having connections with the terrorists blocked its listing under terrorism laws.
The LTTE has been waging a terrorist and separatist war in Sri Lanka, a fellow Commonwealth country. . But Graham maintained that its terrorist activities did not pose an immediate security threat to the Canadians. He also said it would hurt the fragile peace negotiations with the Ranil Wickremesinghe government, described by many as a lame excuse.
But Peter Chalk in his interview said it was true that the LTTE was unlikely to carry out terrorist activities in Canada but said they continued to use front organizations in Canada to funnel vast amounts of money back home through extortion of Tamil Canadians , drug running , people smuggling and other criminal activities in Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver
Describing the LTTE as “ one of the most sophisticated and deadly insurgencies in the world “ quoting the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Chalk categorically stated Canada’s pledge to fight global terrorism could not be taken seriously if it failed to outlaw LTTE
Contrary to what has been said about the ban of the LTTE in Canada Clarke said instead such a ban would bring pressure on the terrorist group to enter into a political solution through negotiations.
