So, it's looking like some

So, it's looking like some of the money from the UN's Oil for Food scam might have found its way into Al-Qaeda's pockets.

{...}Now, buried in some of the United Nation's own
confidential documents, clues can be seen that underscore the
possibility of just such a Saddam-Al Qaeda link — clues leading to a
locked door in this Swiss lakeside resort. Next to that door, a festive
sign spells out in gold letters under a green flag that this is the
office of MIGA, the Malaysian Swiss Gulf and African Chamber.
Registered here 20 years ago as a society to promote business between
the Gulf States and Asia, Europe and Africa, MIGA is a company that the
United Nations and the U.S. government says has served as a hub of Al
Qaeda finance: A terrorist chamber of commerce.
{...}As is typical of terrorist financial webs, the details surrounding
MIGA quickly become bewildering — part of the point being to
camouflage the illicit flow of funds with legitimate business. Part of
the problem in finding the truth is that cross-border transactions out
of such financial havens as Switzerland are smothered in banking
secrecy.
But even with that secrecy — and shortly after the Sept.11, 2001,
attacks on the United States — both MIGA and its chief founder and
longtime president, Ahmed Idris Nasreddin, landed on the U.N. watchlist
of entities and individuals belonging to, or affiliated with Al Qaeda.
Nasreddin is a member of the terror-linked Muslim Brotherhood
Nasreddin's longtime business partner, Egyptian-born Youssef Nada, also
of the Muslim Brotherhood, likewise appears on the U.N.'s Al Qaeda
watchlist, as do a slew of both Nasreddin's and Nada's enterprises.
Former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill in August 2002 described Nada
and Nasreddin as "supporters of terrorism" involved in "an extensive
financial network providing support to Al Qaeda and other
terrorist-related organizations."
Far less attention has been paid to the small, select band of MIGA's
other charter members. But one of them, Iraqi-born Ahmed Totonji, set
up shop years ago just outside Washington, D.C., and is now among those
named by U.S. federal authorities in an investigation into a cluster of
companies and Islamic non-profits based in Herndon, Virginia, suspected
of having funneled money to terrorist groups.
MIGA had other founders as well. One of them, who does not appear on
the U.N. terror list, is an Arab businessman now in his early 60s,
Abdul Rahman Hayel Saeed.
Described by an acquaintance as urbane, polite and fluent in English,
Hayel Saeed was born into one of Yemen's most prominent business clans,
owners of a family-held global conglomerate based in the Yemeni capital
of Taiz and named for its founding patriarch: the Hayel Saeed Anam
Group of Companies, or HSA.
From Yemen, the HSA group boasts a far-flung business empire, including
a Yemen-based Islamic bank, and a host of business subsidiaries,
affiliates and regional trading offices in places ranging from the
United Kingdom to Egypt, Morocco, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Malaysia,
Indonesia, Russia and China.
Abdul Rahman Hayel Saeed sits on the HSA board of directors, and ranks
high in the management — he is currently running HSA's regional
office in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. In MIGA, Hayel Saeed holds a prominent
spot, as one of four co-founders who back in 1984 delegated power of
attorney to the terrorist-linked Nasreddin, giving him authority to run
the company.
Swiss registry documents show that Hayel Saeed has never resigned from
MIGA, nor revoked that power of attorney. Queried about this link to
MIGA, neither Hayel Saeed nor the HSA Group's chairman of the board,
Ali Mohamed Saeed, has made any response.
{...}One of the big questions is whether any of the money skimmed from
Oil-for-Food also slopped into terrorist-financing ventures such as
MIGA.
It's important to note that in tracking terrorist financing, the
simplest starting points are the visible links, the potential
connections through which money might most easily have flowed. Proving
that funds actually coursed through those conduits is far more
difficult.
In the case of Hayel Saeed, MIGA and the HSA Group, there is no public
information available about the precise flow of funds, and no proof
that Saddam's money made its way to MIGA. But in looking for patterns
that beg for further investigation — especially by authorities with
access to detailed U.N. records and information on MIGA accounts —
some items here stand out.
Most simply, there is the question of why HSA was among those companies
favored by Saddam for such a fat slice of business. It is increasingly
clear that Saddam did not, on average, choose his contractors either at
random, or because they were the most cost-efficient suppliers of
relief for the people of Iraq. While some of the deals may have been
entirely legitimate, many melded payments for humanitarian goods with
illicit kickbacks and payoffs. In such cases, it was a lucrative
privilege to be tapped as an Oil-for-Food contractor by Saddam's
regime.
The lingering question, for any individual case, becomes: Was there a
quid pro quo?{...}

Go read the whole thing.
So, while not definitive in any way, shape or form, there are enough
red flags sticking out of this whole mess to set a bull on a rampage.
I'm not going to go a' speculating, but if this does indeed flesh
out...well, that would be remarkable. The whole "Bush lied about WMD"
excuse will go the way of the dodo rather quickly. Its irrelevancy will
be outed and the link between the War on Terror and Iraq will have been
firmly established. Fox will be showing this report in its extended
format on Breaking Point tomorrow night at 9pm EDT.

Posted by: Kathy at 10:48 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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