Front Page

Front Page

Kampuchea deports second LTTE arms man to India
A second accomplice in the highly secretive operations of the KP Department - the self styled arms procurement unit of the LTTE - operating in Kampuchea has given the slip to the authorities. His involvement came to light only when authorities stepped up investigations into the issue this week, days after The Sunday Times exclusively reported it.

Deported from Kampuchea together with Kaushalyan Sivalingam alias David from Phnom Penh, the man boarded an India-bound flight. Though a Sri Lankan national, he had used an Indian passport, improperly documented, to undertake the journey. Both he and David had remained in the transit lounge of the Don Muang International Airport in Bangkok for nearly two hours awaiting their flights after being deported from Kampuchea. The Kampuchean authorities had believed David's accomplice was an Indian national.

The Sunday Times report last week said moves by Defence Secretary Austin Fernando in agreeing to accept David's deportation to Colombo put paid to efforts over a full fledged inquiry. In a letter to The Sunday Times, the Op Hq of the Ministry of Defence simply said "Defence Secretary Fernando denies the allegations stated in the said report." The fact that his inaction led to the men concerned going scot-free, however, is a fact.

David, as The Sunday Times report revealed last week, is said to be one of the key players in the KP Department resident in Phnom Penh. Operating under cover of running a computer firm named Debug Computers (which has no links to a Colombo based firm by that name) it is allegedly involved in effecting millions of dollars in bank transfers and procuring sophisticated weapons and communication equipment.

Police sources said yesterday that David who checked in at a five-star hotel in Colombo after being deported from Kampuchea visited his girl friend in a Colombo suburb and later went to a guerrilla-controlled area in the east.

Back to Front Page