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U.S.-Saudi Anti-Terror Operation Planned
Task Force Will Target Funding By Douglas Farah Washington Post Staff Writer Tuesday, August 26, 2003 EFL Saudi Arabia and the United States have for the first time agreed to set up a joint task force that will station U.S. law enforcement officials in the desert kingdom to target individuals suspected of funneling millions of dollars to al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations, officials from both countries said yesterday. PR weâve all heard before... Senior officials of the FBI and the Internal Revenue Service are flying to Riyadh today to iron out the operational details of the group, which will focus on mining information from bank accounts, computer records and other financial data to track and shut down the money flow, according to senior officials from both governments. Ah, the IRS - so they are getting serious as these guys rival the Saoodis in arrogance. Other similarities will be left for another day... Although several joint task forces have been tried before, none allowed U.S. officials to live in Saudi Arabia or have access to Saudi documents and investigations. U.S. and Saudi officials said the impetus for strengthening cooperation between the two nations came from al Qaedaâs attacks in Saudi Arabia in May, when suicide car bombings of residential compounds in Riyadh killed 34 people, including nine assailants. The turnover rate (snicker) of the task force will be something to watch. I could give them a few pointers about where to eat, useful escapist activities, hotel with the best Russian prostitutes, etc, but the IRS has never been half so nice to me, so... naw, phuck âem. Heh. U.S. officials said the creation of the task force is an important step whose effectiveness will depend on how seriously the Saudi government takes the issue. And how many of them speak Arabic so theyâll know when theyâre being excluded from the good shit... "I donât think there is a more immediate way to test the joint resolve of our countries than to have a joint investigative unit, with the linguistic and computer resources of both our countries, that is capable of focusing on specific targets, rather than talking in generalities," said David Aufhauser, the Treasury Departmentâs counsel general, who helped negotiate the agreement. "We now have a testable proposition of peopleâs resolve." Loooong overdue. Dennis Lormel, head of the FBI division investigating terrorist financing, agreed that "it is one thing for the Saudis to say they will cooperate and another to commit the resources to making this work. It was agreed to at a very senior level, so we hope this specifically focused group will work." More... All that bad publicity (14 Saudi 9/11 bombers, paymaster activities for terrorists, dirty charities, the missing pages, asshat madrassah funding - the whole nine yards) may finally yield something akin to cooperation. What I wonder is what happens when the smoking gun is located firmly in the grip of a prominent Royalâs hand? Now that will be the real test... Posted by: .com 2003-08-27 |
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