US Senate unanimous on identifying LTTE as a terrorist organization

July 1997,

The United States Senate has unanimously expressed ‘the Sense of the Senate’ that "the Department of State should list the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) as a terrorist organisation". This expression was inserted as an amendment during the Senate debate on Foreign Operations, Export Financing Related Programmes Appropriation Act of 1998.

The amendment was proposed by Senator Torricelli during the senate proceedings of July 16 when amendments to the act were discussed. ‘The amendment was accepted by Senator McConnell and Senator Leahy, Chairman and Ranking Democratic member respectively of the Senate Sub-Committee on Foreign Operations, Export Financing Related Programmes.

The expression of ‘the view of the senate’ is a recommendation directed at the US Administration in relation to the Congress approval of the 1988 Budget for conducts of foreign operations and related programmes and in the context of the Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, which authorizes the US Secretary of State to designate an organization as a foreign terrorist organization, on the basis of requirements contained in the act. So far the US Department of State has not listed any foreign terrorist organization as authorized by this legislation.

Meanwhile, the Senate Foreign Operations Sub-Committee on Appropriations in its 1998 report has said it "urges the US Administration to expand its support for the anti-terrorism programme in Sri Lanka." Last year’s report of this Committee also stated that "the Committee is concerned about the alarming toll that Tamil terrorists have taken on innocent civilians in Sri Lanka, and urges the administration to seriously consider making $ 750,000 available in anti-terrorism funds to combat this problem".

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