EU Lists Tamil Tigers as Banned Terrorists

The European Union listed Sri Lanka’s rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam as a banned terrorist organization Monday amid an escalation in clashes between the rebels and the military, EU diplomats said.

“One of the consequences is the freezing of the assets,” an envoy said of the decision, made at a regular meeting of EU ministers in Brussels.

The EU action could hurt the war chest of the Tigers, which have sought to raise funds from expatriate ethnic Tamils during trips to Europe for peace talks.

More generally, the ban is a diplomatic slap in the face for the group, which has sought to project an image abroad as viable leaders of a de facto state they want recognized as a homeland for Tamils in the island’s north and east.

The U.S., Canada and Britain have already listed the Tamil Tigers as a terrorist group.

The Tigers pulled out of peace talks last month aimed at ending Sri Lanka’s 2-decade-old civil war. They have said in recent days that an EU ban would only “exacerbate the conditions of war” and could deter them from resuming negotiations.

Since February, more than 280 soldiers, police, civilians and rebels have been killed in what monitors of a 2002 truce and the Tigers call a “low-intensity war.”

Many Sri Lankans fear a return to the full-scale war that killed more than 64,000 people.

Violence continued, and the army said it was investigating reports that suspected rebels shot dead 14 majority-Sinhalese civilians in the restive east Monday.

Two government soldiers also were killed and three were wounded when troops were attacked.

In the first attack, a corporal was slain by a sniper near the northern town of Vavuniya, said Brig. Prasad Samarasinghe, who blamed the Tigers.

In a second attack in Jaffna, farther north, a soldier was wounded when two suspected rebels hurled a grenade at a military truck, Samarasinghe said. The attackers were arrested, he said.

Later Monday, a soldier was killed and two were wounded when an antipersonnel mine exploded in the eastern coastal town of Batticaloa, an officer at the army media unit said.