UK jails ex-S.Lanka Tiger Karuna for ID fraud

By Peter Apps

LONDON, Jan 25 (Reuters) - Britain sentenced renegade ex-Sri Lankan Tamil Tiger rebel Karuna Amman to nine months in prison on Friday for identity document fraud and now rights groups hope he will face additional war crimes charges. The ex-eastern Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) commander is accused by rights groups of torture, abductions, killings and child soldier recruitment both before and after splitting from the mainstream rebels in 2004. Analysts say he switched his support to the government, and rights groups accuse security forces of turning a blind eye to his actions before his own group ousted him last year and he fled to Britain. British officials say they have asked Sri Lanka how Karuna -- real name V. Muralitharan -- was able to acquire an apparently genuine Sri Lankan diplomatic passport under a false name. The Metropolitan police and immigration authorities arrested him in London late last year and he pleaded guilty to magistrates before Christmas. "He has been sentenced to nine months in prison for holding false identity documents," a court official told Reuters. "He has already served 32 days on remand." The maximum sentence would have been two years but rights groups had feared he might just be fined and leave the country. Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers and others have called for Karuna to be charged in Britain for a variety of war crimes but campaigners say witnesses have been reluctant to come forward. They hope the fact Karuna is behind bars will boost their confidence -- but with extra-judicial killings still widespread in Sri Lanka with the resumption of civil war and international criticism of poor witness protection, many are still seen to be too scared to testify. The Sri Lankan government has always denied links to Karuna and said it was happy for the British legal system to take its course. Officials have furiously denied rights abuse charges and refused calls for United Nations human rights monitoring. Karuna and his group the TMVP -- now under new leadership -- also deny abuse claims and say they are fighting to liberate ethnic Tamils from the clutches of the Tigers, banned as terrorists in Britain, Europe, North America and India. TMVP attacks on the mainstream Tigers were seen as a factor in pushing the island back into an all-out war that has killed more than 70,000 over two decades.

Source: Reuters