Dutch prosecutors want long sentences for LTTE fundraisers

Dutch prosecutors Tuesday (27) asked for jail sentences between 10 to 16 years against five suspected Tamil Tigers for aiding the LTTE from the Netherlands, including collecting funds.

“We are asking for long sentences. The suspects were consciously involved in an international terrorist organisation,” quoting prosecutor Ward Ferdindessen, AFP reported.

The prosecution asked for three sentences spanning a decade each, a 12-year sentence and a 16-year sentence, with Ferdindessen saying “if we are demanding heavy penalties... it’s for the future, so it won’t happen again.”

The five defendants are accused of having collected money and information for the LTTE, listed since 2006 by the European Union as a terrorist organisation.

The men are charged with organising illegal lotteries, asking for subsidies for “humanitarian purposes” from Dutch municipalities and threatening the Sri Lankan community in the Netherlands.

Prosecutors said by extension, the men were responsible for the LTTE’s actions like the recruitment of child soldiers and murder.

Arrested in April and June last year as part of a probe in the Netherlands into the activities of the banned LTTE, the five have lived in the country for “a long time and have Dutch nationality,” national prosecution spokesman Wim de Bruin told AFP.

Judgment is expected in the second half of October.