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A Magistrate?s Court in Melbourne committed three Australians of Sri Lankan Tamil origin to stand trial in the Supreme Court of Australia last afternoon for engaging in terrorism related offences in Australia.

Aruran Vinayagamoorthy, Sivarajah Yathavan and Arumugam Rajeevan were charged by the Director of Public Prosecutions for having committed three offences under the Criminal Code Act, and the Charter of the United Nations Act of Australia for having been members of the LTTE which is a terrorist organisation, providing funds and material support to the LTTE and making available assets collected in Australia to the LTTE.

The committal followed a preliminary hearing in Australia against the three defendants based on a case investigated into by the Anti-Terrorism Task Force of the Australian Federal Police (AFP), states a Foreign Ministry press release.

In addition to Australian Police Officers, several Sri Lankan legal, military, naval and police senior officers testified in the case against the LTTE activists.

The committal signals a clear acceptance of the view by the Magistrate that the LTTE is an international terrorist organization threatening the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Sri Lanka. Previously the Ministry of Foreign Affairs facilitated the AFP to conduct investigations in Sri Lanka and collect evidence.

The judicial finding by the Melbourne Magistrate lends support to the Government of Sri Lanka?s request to the Australian Government to proscribe the LTTE and its front organizations.

The trial against the three LTTE activists will commence in 2008/9 in the Supreme Court of Victoria

Man jailed 27 years for murdering his in-laws
December 14, 2007 12:30pm

A MELBOURNE man has been sentenced to 27 years' jail for the murder of his parents-in-law.

Sarath Laksham Hettiarachchi killed Sammy and Iranganie Perera at his Hallam home, southeast of Melbourne, on March 7 last year by stabbing them to death.

He must serve a minimum of 22 years.

Supreme Court Justice Betty King said Hettiarachchi, 47, had carried out the killings in a 'savage and agitated manner' and shown no remorse.

The court was told Hettiarachchi's wife Badrakanthi watched helplessly as her husband stabbed her father, who was nursing his four-month-old granddaughter and then went on to attack her mother.

The murders occurred minutes after police served Hettiarachchi with an intervention order taken out by his wife.

Justice King said Hettiarachchi's reaction in attacking the elderly, defenceless couple, both 76, was totally out of proportion.

She said Hettiarachchi expressed no sorrow and maintained his innocence.

'You said you had nothing to do with the killings, it must have been your wife because she was mad,' she said.

The court was previously told the dead couple had arrived in Australia from Sri Lanka the previous month for a holiday and were staying with Hettiarachchi and his wife at their home.

The crown prosecution previously told the jury Hettiarachchi's Sri Lankan-born wife found him controlling and was barely allowed to leave the house following their arranged marriage.

The prosecution said Mr Perera had challenged Hettiarachchi about the way he treated his daughter on the day before the stabbing.

During her husband's trial, Badrakanthi Hettiarachchi told the jury she had obtained an intervention order against him the day before her parents were killed.

She said police came to their home and served him with the order on March 7.

Her husband packed some belongings and left the home, only to return a few minutes later, she said.

Hettiarachchi went into the kitchen, came back with a knife in each hand and went to her father, who was holding the couple's baby daughter on his lap, she said.

'He put one knife into one hand and pushed Rosie away from dad's chest. He stabbed my dad. I saw him stab my dad's chest,' she said.

'I was very scared. I thought I was next to be stabbed. I just closed my eyes.

'Then I open my eyes. I saw he was stabbing my mum's mouth.'

She said she went to her mother's aid, and her husband dropped the two knives nearby and left without saying anything.

A Supreme Court jury found Hettiarachchi guilty of the murders on November 5.