The Canadian Police, in an affidavit to submitted to a Toronto Court, said that the World Tamil Movement (WTM) continues to raise funds for the LTTE despite the announcement made by the Canadian Government that it has outlawed the movement under the Anti-Terrorism Act, after investigations revealed undeniable links with the LTTE, widely considered the most ruthless terrorist organisation in the world.
Counterterrorism police searched a building in Montreal last month due to suspicions it was still being used to raise money for Tamil Tigers guerrillas two years after police first raided it for the same reason, National Post said in a recent report. The RCMP searched the Montreal office of the World Tamil Movement on Sept. 3, seizing items allegedly linked to Tamil Tigers fundraising, according to documents recently unsealed by the Federal Court.
A judge authorized the search after police officers noticed collection tills and items bearing the Tamil Tigers emblem inside the building. The building had been emptied of all such materials during a 2006 police raid. "Some of those items are similar to the ones seized on April 13, 2006, and indicate that the same type of activities [are] still going on in the building in 2008," according to a police affidavit filed in the court. The search is the latest development in a massive terrorist financing investigation that spans three provinces and is trying to unravel a network the RCMP says has raised millions to arm the Tamil Tigers.
The World Tamil Movement (WTM) purports to be an ordinary community group, but the newly unsealed police affidavit says it is actually a "foreign branch" of the guerrillas, used to collect money from Canadian Tamils to finance the civil war and the purchase of arms. RCMP Constable Eric Boissonneault wrote in the affidavit that the "sole purpose" of the Montreal WTM office was "facilitating" the cause of the Tigers. He also accused the group of using aggressive fundraising methods.