Posted on 07/24/2006 3:03:49 AM PDT by Clive
TORONTO - Details of an RCMP terror-financing investigation unsealed by the Ontario court have revealed the method used by police to decide which terrorist groups they should target.
A summary of Project OSALUKI, which is probing an alleged Tamil Tigers money-for-arms scheme in Canada, says the investigation was launched in response to an exercise called Sleipner.
Using the Sleipner model, the RCMP's financial intelligence branch conducted an analytical survey that identified the Tamil Tigers as "a National Strategic Priority for the RCMP," the police report says.
The results were forwarded to RCMP Integrated National Security Enforcement Teams across the country "in order to highlight a proposed plan of action to investigate the activities of the World Tamil Movement (WTM) in Canada."
Sleipner is a survey method used to canvass dozens of experts both inside and outside law enforcement circles. It results in a "reliable consensus" about the level of threat posed by various crime and terror groups.
"The Sleipner model or technique is an analytical and forecasting methodology used for intelligence-led policing," said Carleton University professor Martin Rudner, director of the Canadian Centre of Intelligence and Security Studies.
"It is certainly used by the federal police to analyze and discern links among disparate facts and attributes. This can help the RCMP to undertake risk assessments, identify threats and predict criminal trends."
According to Crown documents disclosed last week, it was one such Sleipner survey that prompted the RCMP to launch its probe of Tamil Tigers financing activities in Canada in July, 2002.
Since then, the RCMP has been investigating allegations the Tigers, a Sri Lankan separatist group responsible for scores of suicide bombings and assassinations, has been receiving money from the WTM in Canada to purchase weapons.
In April, days after the Conservative government placed the Tigers on Canada's list of designated terrorist groups, the WTM began removing documents from its Montreal and Toronto offices, the RCMP alleges.
Police then raided the offices. The Vancouver branch was searched last fall. No charges have yet been laid, but a heavily edited RCMP summary of the investigation, released on Wednesday by the Ontario Court of Justice, provides the first glimpse into the four-year probe.
It claims the WTM has been raising money in Canada using such methods as authorized pre-payment schemes to finance the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and its war for an independent Tamil state.
Tamil-Canadian groups have long complained about being unfairly targeted by intelligence and police officers, but the investigation overview claims the focus on the Tigers was not random.
It describes how, since the 9/11 attacks, the RCMP has used the Sleipner method to determine which of the roughly 50 terrorist groups with a presence in Canada should be a priority for national security investigators.
"This investigation commenced with the dissemination of a report generated and prepared by the Financial Intelligence Branch of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police dated the 22nd day of April, 2002," the overview says.
"The introduction segment of this report detailed that the Sleipner model, utilized by the RCMP in the analytical aspect of criminal investigations, lists the LTTE as a national priority for the development of intelligence on terrorist groups."
So far, Project OSALUKI has found "significant evidence" of terrorist financing, RCMP national security investigator Corporal Satish Tarachandra writes in a sworn "information" used to obtain a warrant to search the WTM offices.
Yesterday, the president of the WTM declined to comment on the police allegation the non-profit group had violated three of Canada's terror financing laws. "Well, the matter is with the police investigations and the court and I have no comment," Sitta Sittampalam said.
Ditto that.
As a point of interest, 'Sleipner' is Odin's horse in Norse mythology. Appropriately enough a government project, it has eight legs. ;^)
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