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| Court links Missouri charity to terror |
| 2005-09-17 |
| A Missouri charity financed terrorism and is connected to a similarly named organization in Sudan, a federal judge in Washington has concluded. The findings came Thursday in a 36-page order from U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton in which he threw out a lawsuit filed by the Islamic American Relief Agency-USA, which is based in Columbia, Mo. The charity had sought to thaw its assets, which the Treasury Department froze last year. Lawyers for the Missouri charity have denied any link to terrorism and have said the charity is entirely separate from the Sudanese organization. Drawing both on public records and classified documents, Walton concluded that the Treasury Department had ample authority to freeze the charity's bank accounts as part of the government's war on terrorism. The FBI raided the group's office, and Treasury agents labeled the group as a terrorist supporter on Oct. 13, 2004. The judge ruled on two issues that had lingered over the charity since then: Did the charity directly support terrorists? Was it connected to the Islamic African Relief Agency in Khartoum, Sudan, which the government also has labeled a terrorist supporter? Quoting an opinion from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, Walton wrote: "As the circuit court stated, `There is no constitutional right to fund terrorism.' And the record evidence supports the conclusion that the IARA-USA has done exactly that." Federal authorities alleged that the Columbia charity is part of an international network of nonprofits, including IARA in Sudan, that have supported al-Qaida and its predecessor, the Maktab Al-Khidamat. Treasury officials also accused five international IARA charity officials of supporting other terrorist groups, such as Hamas and the Taliban. Walton also dismissed IARA-USA's contention that it was entirely separate from IARA in Sudan. "In fact, contrary to the plaintiff's argument, this court must conclude that there is substantial evidence in the record to support the defendants' conclusion that the IARA-USA is related and connected to the IARA," Walton wrote. Shareef Akeel, a Michigan lawyer representing the charity, said he was disappointed with the ruling and was exploring the charity's legal options, including an appeal. Akeel, who was not permitted to review the classified evidence, said nothing in the public part of the record showed that the Columbia charity had sent money out of the country for illegal purposes. "We did not fund terrorism," Akeel said. "There is no evidence to suggest that." Akeel acknowledged that IARA-USA occasionally had partnered with the Sudanese charity on individual projects. And he pointed out that the United Nations Children's Fund, or UNICEF, contracted with the Sudanese group to rebuild three schools in Iraq. After a U.S. bank declined to process the check because of the terrorism designation, UNICEF backed away from the contract. Akeel asked why the U.S. government had not also sanctioned UNICEF. "They had a contract with IARA in Sudan two months after the raid," Akeel said. The judge, however, did not see a problem. "There is simply no basis to conclude that UNICEF has even remotely the same type and number of ties to the IARA, or any other organization with terrorist ties, as does the plaintiff (IARA-USA)," Walton wrote. Molly Millerwise, a Treasury Department spokeswoman on terrorism issues, said her department was pleased with Walton's decision. "The ruling ... affirms the Treasury's authority to designate and freeze the assets of those bankrolling terrorism," she said. "We are committed to utilizing our financial tools to identify and disrupt the financial webs of terrorist organizations worldwide." The Treasury Department designation also made it illegal for people and institutions to send contributions to the charities. Local FBI spokesman Jeff Lanza declined to comment about IARA-USA, saying he could not speak about an ongoing investigation. IARA-USA sued the government in December. After that, both sides filled the case file with thousands of pages of evidence and legal arguments. While most of the evidence was public, much attention has been focused on classified Treasury Department documents. As part of its motion to dismiss the charity's lawsuit, government lawyers submitted a 36-page document, which they said contained undisputed facts that showed the charity's links to terrorism. But in the public version of the document, 29 pages either were blank or partly censored of classified information. The charity also appealed to the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control to administratively reconsider its terrorist designation. The office, however, ruled against IARA-USA's request in March. |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |