A petrol station cashier named Abdul Samad Mohamed Raik, a Sri Lankan national has been jailed for 33 months in UK after pleading guilty for a petrol station credit card fraud.

Rasik, of Gilbert Close, Rushey Mead, Leicester, aged 33, confessed that he was engaged in cloning 500 credit cards of British customers for the LTTE terrorist outfit to steal 175,000 British Pounds.

He also admitted to court of possessing a false Indian passport. The forged passport has been provided to him by the LTTE to flee the country if necessary, but said he had not availed himself of this option.

In this case it was revealed that the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam withdrew money from ATM machines amounting to 175,000 British Pounds from the accounts holders from various cities in India, Malaysia, Canada, United States, and Australia to bank-roll terrorism and the war in Sri Lanka.

It was also revealed that the terrorist group using card accounts withdrew money and also bought various goods illegally for their cause.

During the investigations, the British Police has unveiled that credit cards of British nationals had been used as far away as Australia and Malaysia, newspapers said.

Unsuspecting customers who bought fuel at the Jet service station, in Houghton-on-the-Hill, were unaware that cashier Abdul Samad Mohamed Raik used a cloning device when processing their card payments. The cloning device was similar to a pin hole camera. In Britain, credit cards cannot be used with a pin number for added protection. So, both the credit card number and the pin number had to be cloned for the crime, sources said.

In 1999, Raik applied for entry to the UK as a student and obtained one which was valid until October 2005.