Before consummating the arms deal, buyers for a South Asian rebel group needed an expert.
So they turned to Thirunavukarasu Varatharasa, a citizen of Sri Lanka and a member of the Tamil Tigers, which is designated as a terrorist organization by the U.S. government. Prosecutors say he knew how to inspect the fully automatic weapons and surface-to-air missiles to determine whether they had flaws.
Varatharasa was arrested in Guam after inspecting the military hardware during a clandestine meeting with undercover American agents from Maryland.
In U.S. District Court in Baltimore yesterday, the 37-year-old father of two received a sentence of almost five years in federal prison on charges of conspiracy to provide support to a foreign terrorist organization and the attempted exportation of arms and munitions.
Varatharasa is one of six suspected South Asian arms dealers who have pleaded guilty to trying to ship restricted, high-tech weapons to rebels in Sri Lanka in 2006.
"I have to conclude that he played a very significant role in the attempt to smuggle very dangerous, sophisticated weapons to an organization that would use them to violent purposes," U.S. District Judge Catherine C. Blake said.
Varatharasa addressed the judge briefly yesterday, saying through an interpreter that he feared for his life if he had to return to Sri Lanka.
Demand for the weaponry is so high that federal agents were able to set up an elaborate sting centered in Baltimore in the summer of 2006. Immigration and customs officials say their undercover operations have routinely nabbed those seeking banned weapons in Maryland, a state with many defense contractors.
Investigators posed as representatives of a defense company and lured a Singapore arms broker to Baltimore. In July 2006, they put Haniffa Bin Osman up at an Inner Harbor hotel and shuttled him to a shooting range in Harford County so that he could test-fire machine guns he wanted to buy. Bin Osman, who also pleaded guilty, was the one who brought in Varatharasa to inspect the arms before the deal was completed in Guam, according to prosecutors.
Prosecutors say the arms dealers paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to export firearms and ammunition, surface-to-air missiles, night-vision goggles and other military weapons and gear. Most were to benefit the Tamil Tigers, a rebel group seeking a homeland for ethnic Tamils on Sri Lanka, an island in the Indian Ocean.
