DEMARCHE ON EU LISTING OF THE LTTE AS A TERRORIST

C O N F I D E N T I A L LONDON 003207 SIPDIS SIPDIS STATE FOR SA/INS, EB/ESC/TFS, S/CT, EUR/ERA, EUR/PGI, AND EUR/UBI E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/04/2016 TAGS: ETTC KTFN PREL PTER CO UK SUBJECT: DEMARCHE ON EU LISTING OF THE LTTE AS A TERRORIST ORGANIZATION REF: A. STATE 66523 ¶B. 05 LONDON 7704 Classified By: Economic Counselor Sandra Clark for reasons 1.4(b) and ( d) ¶1. (C) Embassy raised reftel points with Simon Bond of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office's South Asia Department and Ben Lyon of the FCO's Counterterrorism Policy Department. Lyon said that the UK fully supports an EU designation of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). LTTE is already proscribed in the UK (roughly akin to our Foreign Terrorist Organization designation). Bond's boss, South Asia Department Deputy Head John Yapp, said that the UK welcomes our "more aggressive" stance towards disrupting LTTE's sources of funding and weapons. ¶2. (C) Lyon (please protect) said that the next possibility for the EU to consider a designation of LTTE would be the June meeting of the Clearinghouse. Lyon said that the date for the Clearinghouse meeting had not yet been finalized, but that it was likely to be either June 12 or 14. ¶3. (C) Lyon said that the general feeling (not based on specific reporting) within the FCO was that June represented the "best chance ever" for gaining Clearinghouse consensus for an EU designation. This is a factor both of LTTE's actions in Sri Lanka, and the fact that Norway had decided to no longer associate itself with the Common Security and Foreign Policy (CSFP) decision which implements Clearinghouse sanctions. ¶4. (C) According to Lyon, Norway was associated with the EU CSFP on designations up until January 2006. This meant that if the EU agreed to designate a terrorist entity, Norway would automatically have to implement that decision. Lyon said that Norway, as facilitator of the peace process, did not want to be in a position of having to freeze LTTE's assets because it would no longer appear neutral. Lyon said he believed that other Nordic countries had previously blocked consensus on an LTTE designation on behalf of Norway, which is not a member of the EU and therefore could not block consensus itself. Lyon speculated that Norway had decided to no longer associate itself with the Clearinghouse process because it saw a designation as inevitable and wanted to be sure it would not have to freeze LTTE's assets. , as facilitator of the peace process, it did not want to be put in the position of having to freeze LTTE's assets. Yapp believes that the Nordic countries will still follow Norway's lead on this issue. ¶4. (C) Lyon said that, to his knowledge, Denmark, Sweden and Finland have blocked EU consensus on a designation of LTTE in the past. Visit London's Classified Website: http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/eur/london/index. cfm Tuttle