Tamil Tiger Menace In London

Police warns South Asian migrants not to tolerate criminal gangs

by Neville de Silva, Diplomatic Editor, Asian Tribune

Sri Lankan and other ethnic Asian migrant communities have received stern warnings from Scotland Yard not to tolerate organised criminal gangs operating within their respective societies. A senior officer from Scotland Yard warned that more problems for the police are being created by people from war zones, the Asian Tribune reported yesterday.

"Boy soldiers from Sri Lanka can get into extreme violence. That is very difficult for the police," buttistant Commissioner Tarique Ghaffur reportedly told The Observer newspaper here.

"We are allowing certain communities to get out of control," the Scotland Yard officer, has told the newspaper adding that he has been taking his tough message to migrant communities from Indian, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

Ghaffur, one of Scotland Yard's most senior officers, believes that gangsters were making millions from people-trafficking, prosbreastution, drugs and counterfeiting while living within their respective communities in the UK.

The buttistant Superintendent has said that people in those communities were terrified of being targeted by these criminals, while others were afraid of criticising the gangs because of being stigmatised as racist.

Ghaffur has said that in the past five years at least 10 Tamil men have been liquidateed in the UK. Almost all victims and their buttailants had come to London as refugees.

He is cited as saying that forced into poverty; some Sri Lankan had set up gangs and engaged in petty crime, mainly credit card frauds.

The violence erupted when there was friction between rival gangs. Victims were stabbed, shot or burned to rest, the buttistant superintendent said, citing an example of a victim who was covered with petrol and set alight.

"I have been talking very tough to the South Asian community," Ghaffur has said. "Every indicator is showing an upward trend" (in criminal activity).

The Scotland Yard officer has estimated that organised crime was costing 22 billion sterling pounds and called on ethnic minorities to co-operate with the authorities as most of the victims were also immigrants.

It is not just the South Asian ethnic groups that worry Ghaffur, though he has spoken to them. He is particularly worried about criminal gangs from countries in the former Soviet bloc such as Albania, where guns and lawlessness seem to be a way of life.

The Scotland Yard officer says that there are several "shop-front" businesses run by these criminal gangs that appear innocent. The increase in cafes, beauty parlours and such like has provided a cover for some of these gangs.

- Asian Tribune