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EU Court rejects move to lift ban on LTTE
View(s):The European Union’s General Court this week rejected an appeal to lift the proscription of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) as an international terrorist organisation within Europe.
The petitioners, the European Political Subdivision of the LTTE based in Denmark, were ordered to pay their own legal costs and those incurred by the Council of the European Union (EU). They had applied to annul the relisting of the LTTE as a terrorist organisation by the European Council in January 2019, ten years after the military defeat of the LTTE.
The European Council had held that in 2019 that the LTTE’s “international fundraising and revival capacities remained” despite its military defeat ten years earlier.
The LTTE was first listed as a terrorist organisation by the EU in 2006.
The EU’s position against the LTTE was supported by the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland. The Court held that the existence of an armed conflict within the meaning of international humanitarian law and EU law does not exclude the prevention of terrorism.
The Court rejected multiple pleas lodged by the LTTE branch in Denmark before dismissing the action in full. The argument that the LTTE had transformed into a transnational network composed of various divisions which respects Tamil rights and the peaceful enjoyment of the right to self-determination, was also rejected. It also stated: “In fact, a distinction must be drawn between, on the one hand, the objectives which a people or the inhabitants of a territory seek to attain and, on the other, the conduct in which they engage in order to attain them”.
The Petitioners had stated that, until 2009, the fundamental rights of the Tamils were denied by the Sri Lankan Government and that that people suffered serious discrimination. The LTTE participated in a legitimate armed conflict with the aim of ensuring the right of the Tamil people to self-determination.
They argued that humanitarian law, which is therefore applicable, does not preclude recourse to force in such circumstances. In particular, it does not prohibit the taking of human lives in the course of war, which includes not only those of active combatants, but also those of civilians.
The Court said that the objective of the European Union and its Member States is to combat terrorism, whatever form it may take, in accordance with the objectives of current international law.
The background to the dispute was that, on September 28, 2001, the United Nations Security Council had adopted Resolution 1373 (2001) to combat terrorism and, in particular, the financing of terrorism. All States were, inter alia, to freeze without delay funds and other financial assets or economic resources of persons or entities who commit, or attempt to commit, terrorist acts or participate in or facilitate thereto as well as entities acting on behalf of, or at the direction of such persons and entities.
On December 27, 2001, having regard to the implementation of Resolution 1373 (2001), the Council of the European Union gave effect to the measures in Common Position 2001/931, adopting Regulation (EC) No 2580/2001 on specific restrictive measures directed against certain persons and entities with a view to combating terrorism. The LTTE of which the applicant claimed to be the European Political Subdivision, had been included in the lists of persons and entities associated with terrorist acts.
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