Pubdate: Fri, 15 Mar 2002
Source: Indian Express, The (India)
Contact:  2002 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
Website: http://www.expressindia.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1980

KASHMIRI MILITANTS TAKING TO DRUG TRAFFICKING FOR FUNDS: US

WASHINGTON, MARCH 14: US officials have said terrorists belonging to 
Kashmiri outfits, the LTTE and other organisations are increasingly turning 
to drug trafficking as a source of funding as heightened international 
efforts have diminished the state sponsors.

"Throughout the region of South Asia and the former Soviet Union, proximity 
to cultivation and production, combined with the infrastructure provided by 
the traffickers, has encourged mutually beneficial relationships between 
terrorist groups and drug traffickers," Rand Beers, Assistant Secretary of 
State for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs and Francis 
Taylor, ambassador-at-large for counter-terrorism told the Senate Judiciary 
Subcommittee.

Regarding Kashmiri militant groups, they said "these groups likely take 
part in the drug trade to finance their activities given their proximity to 
major production and refining sites and trafficking routes."

The "individual LTTE members and sympathisers worldwide traffic drugs - 
particularly heroin - to raise money for their case, but there is no 
evidence of official LTTE involvement in the drug trade," they said.

"The LTTE reportedly has close ties to drug trafficking networks in Burma, 
and Tamil expatriates may carry drugs in exchange for training from Burma, 
Pakistan and Afghanistan," the officers claimed.

"The relations between drug traffickers and terrorists benefit both. Drug 
traffickers benefit from terrorists' military skills, weapons supply and 
access to clandestine organisations," they said. "Terrorists gain a source 
of revenue and expertise in illicit tansfer and laundering of proceeds from 
illicit transactions", they added.

Taylor listed terrorist groups with known links to drug trafficking around 
the world - from Colombia, Peru, Bolivia and Paraguay to Afghanistan, 
which, he said, accounts for more than 70 per cent of the world's supply of 
opiates.

The Lebanese Hizbollah group, he said, is increasingly involved in drug 
trafficking. Terrorist organisations in Europe and South-East Asia are also 
tied to illicit drugs.

Asked about the prospect of paying Afghan farmers for their poppy crop and 
then confiscating it, Beers said there are "real practical limits" to that 
approach. (PTI)
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