Karuna in London jail, what’s next?

Breakaway LTTE “eastern commander” Karuna will possibly spend only five months or less of his nine-month jail term setting a poser for the British authorities and himself. The British authorities are studying information provided under interrogation by Karuna since his arrest early November and from other sources including UN agencies operating in Sri Lanka and human rights organisations, to pin him down for possibly violating the UN Convention against Torture which is wide- ranging, to bring charges against him.

The British Government has been under pressure from human rights organisations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, to bring Karuna to justice for “war crimes” and for allegedly violating international humanitarian laws since Karuna’s arrest was first revealed.

Vinayagamoorthy Muralitharan alias Karuna was sentenced on Friday at the Isleworth Crown Court by Judge McDowell to nine months imprisonment for violating British immigration laws by entering Britain on a Sri Lankan diplomatic passport that carried his photograph but a different name.

David Harvey Philips from the British legal firm David Philips appeared for Karuna while Robert William Meikel appeared for the prosecution, court sources told the Sunday Times. The sentence was mitigated as Karuna had already spent six weeks in custody following his arrest.

But the British authorities are unlikely to have the luxury of even nine months to find corroborative evidence that would satisfy the Crown Prosecution Service(CPS) to frame charges under British law that allows Britain to try persons for certain serious offences even if they were committed elsewhere in the world.

Given the seriousness of the charges that could be brought under the Convention against Torture and its far reaching political implications the CPS would need to be convinced it had an absolutely watertight case against the LTTE rebel before taking the plunge, especially since it could set an interesting precedent.

Karuna who pleaded guilty at the Uxbridge Magistrates Court on December 24 to breaching the UK ID Card Act 2006 for possessing and having under his control an identity document that relates to someone else might well serve much less than his nine-month term with time off for good behaviour.

If in the available time the British investigators are unable to provide the CPS with rock-hard evidence, then they would have to let Karuna go when he is released from Wormwood Scrubs prison where he is expected to spend the next few months. In that case it is believed that the Home Office will want to deport Karuna to Sri Lanka though he had applied for asylum at the time of his arrest. He will fight hard to stay here on the ground that his wife and family are here and that his life would be in danger if he was to return to Sri Lanka.

Though these are compelling arguments in prospective asylum cases, the Home Office earlier told the Sunday Times that this would not stop the hand of British immigration authorities if they wanted to deport him.“The 1951 Refugee Convention allows us to exclude persons from the protection of asylum where there are serious reasons for considering that an individual has committed serious crime or other acts which make him or her undeserving of international protection,” a Home Office spokesman said.

“The convention also provides that in such circumstances persons can be returned to the country of origin even though they may have a well-founded fear of persecution there,” he added. Meanwhile, BBC’s Sinhala Service Sandeshaya on Friday night reported that Karuna had told British immigration authorities that Defence Secretary, Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, 'arranged everything' for him to come to Britain using a diplomatic passport.

Reading Karuna's statement in open court, the prosecution said President Mahinda Rajapaksa's younger brother was known to him since he defected from the LTTE, Sandeshaya reported. The passport was given to him only inside the plane bound to UK, according to the statement.

On Thursday, Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama denied any involvement of the government in providing a diplomatic passport and a third person note to facilitate Karuna's visa to enter Britain.