இரட்டை அளவுகோல்Proscription, asymmetry, and the limits of the terrorism frame
The documented proscription record of the LTTE across UK, EU, Canada, India, and the United States — alongside the parallel record of how the same evidentiary thresholds have, or have not, been applied to the Sri Lankan state's Prevention of Terrorism Act. A citation-only audit of asymmetry in the terrorism frame.
This page does not argue that the LTTE was not a terrorist organisation. It does not invite, support, or glorify any proscribed organisation (UK Terrorism Act 2000 §12). What it documents is the proscription record itself — who applied the terrorism label, when, in what forum, on what evidentiary threshold — and asks what the same threshold, applied symmetrically, would mean for the Sri Lankan state's continuing PTA regime.
India
Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, renewed continuously since.
United States
Foreign Terrorist Organization designation, US State Department.
United Kingdom
Terrorism Act 2000 Schedule 2 (proscription).
European Union
Common Position 2001/931/CFSP listing; ANNULLED procedurally by EU General Court 2014 (T-208/11 + T-508/11); re-listed by Council on substantive grounds.
Canada
Criminal Code §83.05 listing, Public Safety Canada.
Cross-reference: /critical-research/ltte-proscription-map, which carries the longer comparative tabulation.
The Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Act No. 48 of 1979 is the principal Sri Lankan state instrument cited in this parallel record. It has been in continuous force for over four decades despite being titled 'temporary'.
Findings on the PTA by named accredited bodies: the International Commission of Jurists (icj-pta) documents the use of the PTA to detain without trial; Amnesty International (amnesty-pta) records confessions extracted under coercion; Human Rights Watch (hrw-pta-2022) tracks ongoing post-war use against Tamil and Muslim communities; the UN Committee against Torture (un-cat-srilanka-2017) and the UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights while countering terrorism (un-srt-srilanka-2017) have each issued concluding observations identifying the PTA as incompatible with treaty obligations.
No comparable proscription regime has been applied by the UK Home Office, the US State Department, the EU Council, or Canada to the Sri Lankan state agencies involved. We do not allege bad faith. We document the asymmetry as a fact of the record.
- · Not a rehabilitation of any proscribed organisation. UK TA 2000 §12 applies on the entire /case/ organ.
- · Not a call for any state or international body to delist, relist, or reclassify any organisation. Adjudication of those questions belongs to the bodies named above.
- · Not a call to proscribe any Sri Lankan state agency. The page documents the asymmetry as a record; it does not prescribe an outcome.
- · Not survivor intake. Survivors of PTA detention route to ITJP, Amnesty, and the OHCHR mandate.