Terrorist cells proliferating in Balkans - as 'white' Al Qaeda being recruited to carry out attacks

December 18, 2005

Terrorist Cells Find Foothold in Balkans

By Rade Maroevic and Daniel Williams

The raid netted explosives, rifles, other arms and a videotape pledging vengeance for the "brothers" killed fighting Americans in Afghanistan and Iraq. Police found the cache in an apartment occupied by an underground group that was aiming to blow up the British Embassy in Sarajevo, Western intelligence officials said.
The Oct. 19 bust in Sarajevo confirmed a suspicion among several intelligence agents that Bosnia and other parts of the Balkans are becoming a launching pad for terrorist attacks in Europe.

In particular, Islamic radicals are looking to create cells of so-called white al Qaeda, non-Arab members who can evade racial profiling used by police forces to watch for potential terrorists. "They want to look European to carry out operations in Europe," said a Western intelligence agent in Belgrade, the capital of Serbia and Montenegro, adjacent to Bosnia. "It's yet another evolution in the tools used by terrorists."

Parts of the Balkans, stuck in lawless limbo after years of war in the 1990s, are ripe recruitment territory for Middle East radicals, intelligence officials say. Bosnia is still divided among Muslim, Croat and Serb population areas, even if nominally united under the 10-year-old Dayton peace agreement that ended ethnic warfare.

Muslim enclaves in Serbia are restive, and Muslim-majority Kosovo remains an estranged province campaigning for independence six years after NATO bombing forced out Serb-dominated Yugoslav troops.
The Balkans have long been a freeway for smugglers of cigarettes, drugs, weapons and prostitutes. "All the conditions are present. Embittered Muslims, arms, corruption -- everything underground operators need to get established," said the Western intelligence official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The raid on the Sarajevo group, which was said to have had contacts with cells in Denmark and Britain, was not the only event that raised concern. During the summer, Italian and Croatian police arrested five people who allegedly plotted to bomb the funeral of Pope John Paul II in Vatican City in April.

In addition, Serbian police accidentally came across a key suspect in the March 2004 bombings of Madrid commuter trains while he was traveling through the country by train. He arrived in the Balkans in July, and Serbian police investigators conjecture that he was seeking haven either in Bosnia or Kosovo and perhaps safe passage to the Middle East. They quickly extradited the man, Abdelmajid Bouchar, a Moroccan citizen, to Spain.

U.S. and allied intelligence officers have long worked together in Sarajevo to keep an eye on Islamic radicals in Bosnia. After the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States, the CIA and other foreign agencies set up a joint, fortified headquarters to keep tabs on terrorism suspects in Bosnia, a Western intelligence source in Sarajevo said.
The spy teams operate separately from the chief international overseers of Bosnia, the Office of the High Representative, according to the official.

During the three-sided war in Bosnia, hundreds of fighters from Arab and other Middle Eastern countries flocked to Bosnia to fight on behalf of the Muslim faction against Croats and Serbs. Many of the foreign mujaheddin , or holy warriors, were expelled after the war, according to the Bosnian government, but others remained and received passports.
Today, parts of Bosnia framed by the cities of Zenica, Tuzla, Sarajevo and Travnik are home to these immigrants and compose the core regions for Islamic militancy, Bosnian police and Western intelligence officials say.

Until recently, the immigrants tried to keep a low profile. Western intelligence officials here and in Belgrade surmised that they wanted to exploit Bosnia as a logistics and transit point and not invite a crackdown from local police or European Union peacekeepers.

The Sarajevo arrests changed that perception. A Bosnian Interior Ministry official, Robert Cvrtak, released the names of four detainees from the raid: Cesur Abdulkadir, who is of Turkish heritage; Mirsad Bektasevic, a Swedish citizen of Bosnian origin; and Bajro Ikanovic and Almir Bajric, both Bosnian citizens. Among their activities, Bosnian police said, were hiding explosives inside lemons and tennis balls and trying to set up training camps in the hills near Sarajevo.
Last Thursday night, Bosnian police arrested a fifth suspect in the town of Hadzici, near Sarajevo. The police found about 20 pounds of explosives hidden in woods near his home. The man, whose name has not been made public, is suspected of being in charge of providing explosives to the rest of group.

Police officials here say Bektasevic, 19, also ran a Web site on behalf of Abu Musab Zarqawi, the Jordanian who heads the insurgent group al Qaeda in Iraq. He had pictures of the White House in his computer, they added.
Bektasevic operated under the code name Maximus and kept in touch with a group of at least three men in Britain. British police arrested them in early November, according to press reports.

A week after the original Sarajevo arrests, police in Copenhagen detained four men ages 16 to 20 and said they had planned suicide bombings somewhere in Europe. "We had a very short period to investigate, but our information indicated that their action was imminent," said a police spokesman, Joern Bro. The Danes believed that the Copenhagen suspects had been in contact by phone and e-mail with Bektasevic.

In August, police in Croatia arrested five Bosnians whom Italian military intelligence had fingered for involvement in a plot to bomb the papal funeral. The group originated in Gornja Maoca, a town in northeastern Bosnia, and had planned to smuggle rocket launchers, explosives and detonators into Italy. The plot fell apart, Western intelligence officials said, when a suspect was arrested in Rome in April. The Croatian police, acting on a tip from the Italians, found the others in Croatia.

The capture of Bouchar, suspected in the Madrid train bombings, in Serbia in July surprised police there. They had thought he was just another Middle Easterner traveling illegally through the country until an Interpol fingerprint check revealed his identity.

Authorities say Bouchar had narrowly escaped death or capture shortly after the Madrid attacks, when police there sealed off an apartment where suspects were hiding. Seven men died in the residence by detonating explosives. Bouchar, however, was taking out garbage at the time and fled, Serbian and Spanish officials say.
He traveled to Brussels, where he expected to obtain forged documents, authorities said. However, his contacts there were either under arrest or fleeing police. He moved on and spent time in Austrian and Hungarian jails, but was freed. No one in either country checked his fingerprints.

When picked up heading toward Belgrade, he was wearing a new business suit. Western intelligence officials in Belgrade note that Serbia, although predominantly non-Muslim, has pockets of Muslims in the Sanjak region near Montenegro as well as Kosovo and other areas along the province's border.

This item is available on the Militant Islam Monitor website, at http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/1430

2008-03-28 The dots begin to connect in a radical network that reaches from Bosnia across Western Europe as police in Bosnia arrest five suspected of plotting to attack Catholic and EUFOR objects, ISA's Anes Alic and Damir Kaletovic report.

In the second major anti-terrorism operation in Bosnia in three years, Bosnian police have arrested five men and seized anti-tank mines, laser sights, electronic equipment, topographic maps and bomb-making manuals.

The ongoing investigation shows so far that the group involved in the alleged plot is connected with earlier terrorism-related arrests in the country, and that the network extends to Western European capitals.

Bosnia and Herzegovina's Federation Anti-Terror Unit on 20 March arrested five men: Rijad Rustempasic, Muhamed Meco, Abdulah Handzic and Edis Velic, all in their early thirties and from Sarajevo, along with Muhamed Ficer, from the central Bosnian city of Bugojno, who was released from custody after questioning.

The four arrested in Sarajevo were members of the local Wahhabi movement - the Saudi-based and financed order following a strict interpretation of Islam. Some of the suspects were already well known to the police for their radical activities. The group had been under surveillance for several months by the Federation Anti-Terror Unit and the State Prosecutor's Office.

Federation Anti-Terror Unit and the State Prosecutor's Office have strong evidence that Rustempasic's group was planning attacks on Catholic Churches and international forces within the country during the Easter holidays.

According to the authors' source from the Federation police, who are running the investigation, the alleged leader of the group is Rustempasic, who was born and raised in Bugojno but moved to Sarajevo four years ago.

On condition of anonymity, the police source said that Rustempasic was one of the most notorious and most violent Bosnian radical Muslim they had so far investigated, and that the suspect has managed to evade prison thanks to the tolerance of the local authorities in Bugojno.

The key suspect

Since the end of the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina in December 1995, Rustempasic's name has appeared in connection with several investigations related to the terrorism and radical Islam.

During the Bosnian 1992-1995 war, Rustempasic was a member of the El-Mujahid unit, headquartered in central Bosnia. The unit was under the official jurisdiction of the Bosnian Army during the war, though it operated autonomously and was comprised of foreign fighters from Islamic countries. The author's police source said it was during that period that Rustempasic developed his bomb-making skills.

Federal police suspect that Rustempasic was responsible for mining the tower of the Catholic Church in the village of Humci, near Bugojno, in July 1996. No suspects were ever arrested in connection with the attack. Police also suspect that Rustempasic was behind numerous threats against Bosnian Croat returnees to Bugojno and other central Bosnian cities where there is a Bosniak (Bosnian Muslim) majority.

In 2004, Rustempasic was arrested by NATO-led Stabilization Force (SFOR) troops in Bosnia for illegal possession of weapons and suspicion of terrorist-related activities. The international forces had found nearly five kilograms of explosives in his possession. For that crime, the court in Bugojno sentenced him to five months parole, during which time he relocated to Sarajevo.
Easy supplies

"In Rustempasic's apartment we seized a hand-made explosive device hidden in a book … and when someone would open the book, the device would be activated," the source said.

The police source said Rustempasic had a couple of supply chains for bomb-making equipment. He would go to the war-time frontlines and dig up anti-tank mines to remove the explosives from inside. Each anti-tank mine contains around 3 kilograms of explosives - enough to cause massive damage.

"We also have evidence that from the money he would get from [sources] in Western Europe, was buying explosives and other equipment on the illegal market here. Also, we have reason to believe that some of the seized materials arrived from other countries in travel bags," the police source said.

The group came under closer scrutiny by the Anti-Terror Unit and the Bosnian State Intelligence Agency (OSA) after an intercepted telephone conversation between Rustempasic and another arrested member of the group.

"Christmas passed and we didn't do anything," one of the group's members told Rustempasic late on 25 December 2007, alerting the authorities.

Federal police had reason to believe that the next opportunity to attack would be the next Catholic holiday, Easter. Analyzing intercepted communiqués, police concluded that would be targets of the group are Sarajevo central Cathedral and Franciscan Monastery in Central Bosnian city of Fojnica.

Aside from Catholic institutions, police also have reason to believe that the group was planning to sabotage electricity supply stations and launch attacks against European Forces (EUFOR) Liaison and Observation Team (LOT) here.

EUFOR has 45 LOTs stationed across the country. One of the intercepted telephone conversations between Rustempasic and another group member mentioned international community targets and talked about locations where international soldiers were based, particularly those coming from countries involved in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Western European connections

Most of the weapons seized during the raid on six locations were found in Rustempasic's apartment in Sarajevo's old town, where he lives with his family.

According to Muhamed Ficer - Rustempasic's brother-in-law who was arrested and released in connection with the plot - the weapons found in the apartment did not belong to Rustempasic but to his brother, currently living in Austria.

Following his release, Ficer told local media that the electronic equipment seized by the police and suspected of being used for bomb-making had actually been found at a garbage dumb and they had planned only to repair and resell it.

According to Ficer, Rustempasic is unemployed (along with the others arrested), and depended on financial assistance from his "brothers" (Wahhabi's) from Austria.

According to Rustempasic's neighbors from Sarajevo suburb of Sedrenik, the house in which he has lived for free for the last four years is owned by Bosniak Deso Karisik, who lives in Germany.

Rustempasic also sparked the authorities' interest during clashes last year between radical and moderate Muslims in Sarajevo and two cities in the country's north. Rustempasic was a close associate of the late, self-proclaimed sheik, Jusuf Barcic, the leader of the local Wahhabi movement. In March last year, Barcic, an aggressive preacher calling for a return to traditional Islam, and his followers tried to forcibly enter several mosques to preach wahhabism, but were prevented by locals. Barcic died in the car accident a month after those incidents.

Another member of the arrested group, Edis Velic, also has a criminal past. According to the police source, Velic spent some time fighting in Chechnya several years ago. Last year, he was fired from a Sarajevo-based private security company after a shooting incident in which Velic shot the owner of a second hand stall in the open market in the legs.

Velic and another detainee, Abdulah Handzic, were present at the recent protests against the deportation of foreign mujahideens and against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Notably, police spotted Velic and Handzic burning US and EU member country flags at the protests.
Ongoing investigation

The arrests on 20 March was the second major crackdown on Bosnian Wahhabis suspected of terrorism in the last three years.

In October 2005, Federation police arrested five men, three of whom were indicted and later convicted on a string of terror charges.

Mirsad Bektasevic, a Swedish national from Serbia; Danish-born Turkish citizen Abdulkadir Cesur; and Bosnian national Bajro Ikanovic were arrested in late 2005 in two Sarajevo suburbs. The three were found guilty of "intending to carry out a terrorist act" in Bosnia or another European country with the aim of forcing the withdrawal of troops from Iraq or Afghanistan.

During the raid on the home of Bektasevic and Abdulkadir police found a suicide bomb belt, nearly 20 kilograms of explosives, guns and a bomb-making video.

Prior to his arrival to Sarajevo, Bektasevic was active in trying to recruit Jihadists through internet sites, using the codename "Maximus." Correspondence between Bektasevic and some Islamists in Denmark led to further arrests and prosecutions. Bektasevic was in contact with Abdul Basit, also known as Abu-Lifa, sentenced by a Danish court in February last year to seven years in prison. He was believed to be a financier of Bektasevic's group.

Having previously been marked as potential militant by Federation and international authorities, Rustempasic appeared even in this case. According to the police source, Bektasevic was also in contact with Rustempasic in the two-month period between his arrival in Bosnia and his arrest.

According to the source, at the time Rustempasic was questioned by police and prosecution investigators and gave very valuable information regarding Bektasevic's case. Investigators had no evidence to charge Rustempasic in that case.

After Rustempasic's group was arrested on 20 March, local authorities discovered several locations, in almost unapproachable mountainous parts of Bosnia, with cottages where military equipment was held and the surrounding area used for military-style exercises. Those locations were discovered after analyzing a map found in Rustempasic's apartment.

They also found another map containing coded signs. Police believe, once decoded, the map will lead to more hidden sights or even potential targets.

"But now we are troubled with the fact that four days prior to Easter, and one day ahead of the group's arrest, a duffle bag containing military equipment arrived in Sarajevo from a Western Europe country, and could be linked to the group," the police source said.

The whereabouts of the bag is still unknown, and police are focusing their investigation on this, hoping for cooperation from those arrested.

A source from the prosecutor's office told ISN Security Watch that in the coming days the investigation into Rustempasic's group will be expanded beyond the borders of Bosnian. It is clear, the source said, that the group is receiving financial and logistical support from wahhabi figures in Western Europe.

Over 1,300 Kosovo Serbs, in addition to those for whom we know they have been killed and whose remains were handed over to their families by the UNMIK during the past 8 years, are still listed as missing. In some cases the entire families were kidnapped by the KLA/UCK at some point during the 1998-1999 war and after UN/NATO took over the administration and security of the southern Serbian province. These people were taken away in an unknown direction and, for all we know, disappeared from the face of the earth. 

Source: Fox News, 27 March

On any given day, log on to RevolutionMuslim.com and a host of startling images appear:

— The Statue of Liberty , with an ax blade cutting through her side;

— Video mocking the beheading of American journalist Daniel Pearl, entitled "Daniel Pearl I am Happy Your Dead :) ";

— Video of a puppet show lampooning U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq ;

— The latest speech from Sheikh Abdullah Faisal, an extremist Muslim cleric convicted in the UK and later deported for soliciting the murder of non-Muslims.

Even more surprising is that RevolutionMuslim.com isn't being maintained in some remote safe house in Pakistan . Instead, Yousef al-Khattab, the Web site creator, runs it from his home in the New York City Borough of Queens.  And, because al-Khattab enjoys the First Amendment right to freedom of speech, all the authorities can do is watch.  Formerly known as Joseph Cohen, al-Khattab is an American-born Jew who converted to Islam after attending an Orthodox Rabbinical school, which he later described as a “racist cult.”  The 39-year-old New York taxi driver launched RevolutionMuslim.com with the mission of “preserving Islamic culture,” “calling people to the oneness of God” and asking them to “support the beloved Sheik Abdullah Faisal, who’s preaching the religion of Islam and serving as a spiritual guide.”

            In 2003 Faisal was convicted in the U.K. for spreading messages of racial hatred and urging his followers to kill Jews, Hindus and Westerners. In sermon recordings played at his trial, Faisal called on young, impressionable Muslims to use chemical weapons to “exterminate unbelievers” and “cut the throat of the Kaffars [nonbelievers] with [a] machete.”  Authorities believe Faisal’s sermons have influenced 2005 London transport bomber Germaine Lindsay and "shoe bomber" Richard Reid, who attended mosques where Faisal preached.

            At times, al-Khattab's postings are farcical, such as a picture of him holding the book "Nuclear Jihad" with a wry smile on his face. Other messages call for radical Muslim rule worldwide.  Al-Khattab claims the Sept. 11 terror attacks were an “inside job,” and he blames U.S. foreign policy for spawning the terrorism that carried out the attacks.  He calls Daniel Pearl, who was kidnapped and beheaded in 2002 by Islamic extremists in Pakistan , “a convicted spy.”  “I could care less about Daniel Pearl,” al-Khattab said in an interview with FOXNews.com. “I’m happy to see that he’s gone.”

            The content changes constantly. One reason is that the fast flow of information allows messages to spread through cyberspace quickly. Another, terrorism analysts say, is to make it difficult for law enforcement to monitor the site.  Despite his radical anti-Western views, al-Khattab says he does not support terrorism of any kind.  Yet, RevolutionMuslim.com claims to be the official site of “North American representatives” for Sheikh Faisal, and it appears dedicated to spreading his radical doctrine.  He says Faisal “never said to kill innocent people” and was unjustly imprisoned. He says the real terror organizations are the U.S. Army, the CIA, and the FBI — and the National Coast Guard, “to a lesser extent.”

            According to RevolutionMuslim, Faisal — who was deported to his native Jamaica in 2007 — is now receiving donations solicited on the site, including money for a new laptop and DVD burner to spread his message.  It's not illegal to post these messages or collect money for Faisal, but it would be if Faisal were designated a terrorist by the U.S. government. He currently is not listed on any government terror list; a Department of Justice spokesman could not confirm or deny if Faisal is being investigated for any terror related activity.  RevolutionMuslim may look amateurish when compared with other extremist Web sites, but it is no less of a threat, says Mia Bloom, political science professor at the University of Georgia ’s School of Public and International Affairs.

“It may lead people who become radicalized by it to turn to other, more dangerous Web sites,” such as those run by terrorist organizations, she said.  Bloom characterized al-Khattab’s message as “narrow” and “misinformed” and said he is attempting to “proselytize or radicalize people who share some of these same ideas.”

            “[He] has obviously been duped or is duping others because that’s not what Islam preaches,” she said.  On his site al-Khattab appears to condemn the very democracy that guarantees him the freedom to express himself — a freedom he cites in a disclaimer on his homepage:  “We hereby declare and make absolute public declaration that revolutionmuslim.com operates under the first amendment right to freedom of religion and expression and that in no way, shape, or form do we call for war against the U.S. government or adhere to the enemies of the United States elsewhere.”  Under the law FBI spokesman Richard Kolko said it is difficult to bring criminal charges against the operators of Web sites like RevolutionMuslim.com unless specific threats are made against an individual or individuals.  Kolko while not speaking directly about RevolutionMuslim said radical sites like these are not often prosecuted.  "It's usually a First Amendment right if they don't cross the threshold of making any threats," said Kolko. "There's nothing we should or could do."  “Until the rhetoric reaches the point in which it’s no longer protected speech under the first amendment, it’s hard to stop it,” said security expert, Harvey Kushner.

Source: the Star-Ledger (NJ), 26 March

The South Jersey men accused of plotting an attack on Fort Dix talked about getting high-powered rifles and firing on the White House or U.S. soldiers, prosecutors say in new court filings.  

One of the defendants, Eljvir Duka, said he wanted to train to be a sniper. "Do you think I could hit George Bush ...” he allegedly asked his brother, Dritan Duka.   At another point, Dritan Duka laughed and said he would join the U.S. military so he could "kill from inside."  The remarks were recorded in February 2007 by an FBI confidential informant who had accompanied the suspects to a firing range in the Pocono Mountains .  Prosecutors disclosed the transcripts for the first time this week, as they asked a federal judge to impose a harsh punishment against the only defendant to plead guilty so far. Agron Abdullahu, a 25-year-old supermarket baker from Buena Vista Township , is scheduled to be sentenced Monday on weapons charges.

            Authorities have described the other defendants, four from Cherry Hill and one from Philadelphia, as "home-grown terrorists" and "radical Islamists" who wanted to storm Fort Dix with automatic weapons and kill as many soldiers as possible. Arrested last May, they face a September trial on charges that include conspiring to kill U.S. military members, a crime punishable by life in prison.  Abdullahu wasn't part of that plot, but last fall he pleaded guilty to conspiring to provide illegal immigrants with firearms. Abdullahu, a legal immigrant from Kosovo, brought four guns on a weekend trip to the Pocono Mountains for his friends to shoot.

            Federal sentencing guidelines recommend between 10 and 16 months for the crime. Like the others, Abdullahu has been jailed since his arrest, so he could possibly walk free next week.

            In their filing, Deputy U.S. Attorney William Fitzpatrick and Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Hammer asked U.S. District Judge Robert Kugler to depart from the guidelines and impose a term that would keep him in prison. They say Abdullahu heard his friends rant against America and knew they were devoted to participating in a jihad.  "As the only participant in the 2007 Poconos trip with a firearm license, defendant Abdullahu was single-handedly responsible for putting fireams in the hands of men whom he knew to be extremely dangerous," they wrote.  Richard Coughlin, the federal public defender representing Abdullahu, said Monday that he would have no comment. He is expected to file a response later this week.

            The government filing includes a dozen pages of transcripts from the 2007 trip, on which prosecutors contend the suspects trained at a shooting range, watched al Qaeda videos and talked openly about their U.S. hatred. Most include banter between the Duka brothers and the wired cooperating witness.  At one point, Dritan Duka tells his brother: "The Taliban are doing great and I give you glad tidings that we are winning the war."  Dritan Duka's attorney, Michael Huff, said he had not yet seen the transcripts but said the men were never serious.  "Despite their talk, despite their rhetoric, they are simply not being serious," he said.  Troy Archie, the attorney for Eljvir Duka, could not be reached for comment.

Dutch Islamic Militant Duo Jailed For Three Years

Source: Reuters, 25 Mar 08

A Dutch court jailed a husband and wife for three years on Tuesday after they were convicted of plotting attacks in a militant Islamic network.

            The pair, 26-year-old Hanan Sarrokh and her 30-year-old husband Lahbib Bachar, were part of the so-called "Hofstad group", a band of young militants mainly of Moroccan origin based in The Hague , the Dutch agency ANP reported. The group has drawn huge public attention after a series of arrests and reports of planned attacks. Judges said they had taken into account the fact that the pair had testified against Samir Azzouz, the most high-profile Hofstad member who is serving a total of 12 years for planning attacks. However, owing to the seriousness of the crimes, the sentence given the pair was higher than that sought by prosecutors, judges said. The Dutch government tightened anti-terrorism laws several years ago after a series of embarrassing acquittals, including of Azzouz in 2005 who was rearrested just months later.

‘Fitna’: Dutch Leader’s Anti-Islam Film Brings Strife

Source: Christian Science Monitor, 26 March

It's a lurking provocation in Europe 's sometimes rocky encounter with its burgeoning Muslim population: For months, a popular, flamboyant far-right Dutch party leader has been preparing an incendiary film about Islam rumored to contain lurid scenes of execution and a flaming Koran. With his flashy dyed platinum hair and his 24-hour security protection, Geert Wilders routinely compares the Koran to Hitler's "Mein Kampf," says almost all terrorists are Muslims, and advocates deporting Islamic clerics.

            So it isn't surprising that the short film – which has yet to secure an outlet that will air it – is being compared to Danish cartoons of the prophet Muhammad that sparked global Muslim riots two years ago. Iran and Pakistan have condemned the video, titled "Fitna" – Arabic for strife. The Taliban has threatened retaliation against Dutch troops in Afghanistan .  "Fitna" has so far been the biggest show never seen, but the buildup has given Mr. Wilders growing publicity, and civic leaders time to respond.

            Unlike Denmark , which held to a free speech position on the cartoons, the Dutch government has been telling Muslim nations and Islamic organizations that it doesn't agree with Wilders's views. The main question that has emerged in the debate is whether it is acceptable for an elected official to use free speech to attack the identity of other groups, even if he or she feels they are causing harm to the Netherlands .  "I don't care if someone hates Islam," says Tafiq Ali, a young Muslim from Morocco who works in a construction firm in Amsterdam . "But is it responsible for a leader to use words that can bring hate and negative consequences?"

            Since January, Wilders has tried – and failed – to air "Fitna" on Dutch TV and then at The Hague 's foreign press center. This week Wilders's backup, a US-based website, was shut down by the hosting service Network Solutions, pending an investigation of its acceptable use policy. Tuesday, the right-wing Czech National Party proposed broadcasting "Fitna," citing the "cowardice" of Dutch and EU politicians. Wilders said he might resort to handing out DVDs in central Amsterdam .  But despite the setbacks, the Sturm und Drang surrounding "Fitna" has been a colassal publicity boon for the controversial politician.  "He doesn't care [about negative consequences]; I think he loves this," says a Hague-based journalist who covers Wilders's party.  Dutch security alerts have gone from "limited" to "substantial" this month. In the Netherlands , the unseen video brings daily press coverage, as well as seminars, TV debates, lectures by the mayor of Amsterdam , and a recent decrying of it as an "unnecessary provocation" by the eminent philosopher Jürgen Habermas, in what he calls the modern condition of a "post-secular Europe ."

            Last week Harry de Winter, a prominent Dutch citizen who is Jewish, took out a large ad in the daily de Volkskrant arguing that if Wilders were to say about Jews what he is saying about Muslims – in other words, if he advocated that temples be closed and rabbis deported – the entire country would rise in retaliation over such an anti-Semitic act.  The Islamic community announced in February it would open its doors to the public after the video airs, to show "we have nothing to hide." A joint ecumenical statement by Protestant and Muslim groups said last week that they "forcefully reject [Fitna] if the Koran and the Prophet Mohammed are treated with contempt."  Heleen Terwijn, who runs weekend schools in inner-city Amsterdam , says, "The good side of this whole thing is that many Muslims who were unknown will become known as normal people with a normal point of view. Too many Dutch see Muslims as scary relatives of Osama bin Laden."

            Still, some of the Dutch worry that the popular fears that Wilders represents are growing faster than Holland 's ability to integrate its rising minorities. Mainstream talk about crime and indifference to Dutch traditions and decorum by Muslims is increasing.

            "The Dutch see kids of color tearing up public trash cans or dumpsters, and they want them thrown in jail," says a researcher at an "Islam in Europe" program at Amsterdam University who was not authorized to speak on the record. "That moves quickly – way too quickly – to a hatred of all of Islam."  While some Dutch writers like the assassinated politician Pim Fortuyn started attacking Islam as a backward idea in the 1990s, Wilders has conflated the message further and has focused on Muslims as people, experts say.

"Fortyn was simply going after Islamic theology, but Wilders is going further," says Gerard van der Ree, a Dutch political scientist in Leiden . "He's equating Islam and Muslims together and causing people to fear and hate them, on the grounds that they are fascist. It's an eliminationist model, ironically."

            In recent months, Wilders has shifted his rhetoric to focus more on Islam than its adherents.  In an interview with the New York Times, one of few Wilders has given, he said, "I believe the Islamic theology is a retarded, dangerous one, but I make a distinction," Wilders said. "I don't hate people. I don't hate Muslims…. I am not saying all Muslims are wrong or are terrorists or criminals. You will never hear me say that."

Wilders is often laughed off as a crank in the Netherlands , popularly referred to as Holland , even while most of the Dutch defend his right to speak.   "It's Holland and I'm proud to live in a country where you can say anything, even if I don't agree," says Jeremy, a café owner in The Hague .  Wilders, who has warned of a "tsunami of Islamization coming to Europe ," has built his career on fears over an immigrant influx – including those of the nearly 1 million Muslims in this country of 16 million residents. His message has resonated with a growing percentage of Dutch voters who feel he is telling truths that elite politicians are too polite or tolerant to voice.

            His popularity rose after the shocking 2004 street killing by a Dutch-Moroccan of filmmaker Theo Van Gogh, who with a Dutch parliamentarian had produced a film criticizing Islam's oppression of women. Two years later, his Freedom Party surprised the elites by scoring nine out of 150 members of parliament in 2006 elections.  Some residents here described conflicted feelings about politicians like Wilders that they detest, and a public discourse that seems not to capture the extent of social divisions in Holland .

"I hear Muslims making very hard statements about their situation," says Woter Mertens, a shop manager and PhD candidate in Amsterdam . "The cultures in Holland are separating further; you can feel it. Our tolerance is being destroyed. We used to be able to have reasonable discussions about things like the burqa or scarf. People did and didn't like it, said so, and did it with some tolerance and certainly openly. Now, no."

            There's little outward tension along the famed canals here, or among the diffident and pragmatic Dutch. Some are tiring of Wilders and the film build-up. "It could come out any time – right now, in two weeks, no one knows," says Hans Ulrich, a retired history teacher in Leiden . "Now we joke that "Fitna" doesn't exist, but is an April fool's trick."

One Rotterdam business consultant, Rhys Jansen, who spent years working for a Dutch oil firm in the Arab world, says Wilders has rightly grasped the uncertainty and worry over losing a good standard of living in a country that traditional Dutch people feel is different from the one they were born in – and he is playing on this fear.

            "He represents fear, the fear we feel, it's all about fear," says Mr. Jansen. "He exacerbates our feelings. We don't know each other anymore. There's less time in our lives, less time to cook, to talk, to socialize. We live in houses with walls two meters high separating our gardens. When I grew up we talked across our gardens. Now if you meet you neighbors, it is pretty much by accident. This is what Wilders understands."   Even many Muslims say they don't like the hidden tensions and new pressures in Holland brought by culture wars. Mehmet, who works in a Leiden falafel and kebab cafe, says he came from Egypt 20 years ago to escape religion. "No one here would bother you about anything," he says. "That's what I like about Holland , but I am worried this is changing."

14-11. STATEMENT

(Given and Family Name) Abdulkarim Meslat

I hereby state that I feel as a citizen of the Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina, that I am prepared to obey the Constitution, laws and other regulations of the Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina, practice all the rights and obligations of a citizen of Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina, and protect the sovereignty and integrity of the Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina and its reputation in the international community.

This statement is a freely given expression of my loyalty to the Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina, and desire to become a citizen of the Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina.

In Vienna, 31 August 1994,
[signed] Meslat Abdulkarim
Official Present [ blank]
Signed by official: [signature illegible]
[stamped with official seal]

14-12Appendix (iv)

Overview of members of the Seventh Muslim Brigade “El-Mujahid” of the Army of BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA [ABiH], who received B&H citizenship[1]

1. Abu El Jud Adnan, born 1960 in Egypt, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then settled in Bocinja, Maglaj municipality
2. Ali Awad Muhamed, born 1962 in Egypt, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then settled in Bocinja, Maglaj
3. Amrou Osmanchevic, born 1968 in Jordan, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then settled in Bocinja, Maglaj
4. Al-Saidi Muhamed, born 1961 in Egypt, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then settled in Bocinja, Maglaj
5. Ahmed Alkotry, born 1965 in Sudan, regulated citizenship based on fictitious residence in Novo Sarajevo municipality, then settled in Bocinja, Maglaj
6. Albany Teher, born in Kuwait, regulated citizenship based on fictitious residence in Novo Sarajevo municipality, then settled in Bocinja, Maglaj
7. Azedine Omerovic, born 1967 in Algeria, regulated citizenship based on fictitious residence in Zenica municipality, then settled in Bocinja, Maglaj
8. Aiman Awad, born 1964 in Syria, received BH citizenship on 23 March 1992 based on participation in ABiH [Translator’s note: it did not exist at the time!], settled in Bocinja, Maglaj
9. Alnaqli Khaled, born in Egypt, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Zenica municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
10. Abdul-D’ail-ii Harj, born 1965 in Lebanon, regulated citizenship based on fictitious residence in Zenica municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
11. Amagad Joussef, unknown foreign citizenship, received BH citizenship, was resident of Bocinja, Maglaj
12. Ayad Osama, unknown foreign citizenship, received BH citizenship, was resident of Bocinja, Maglaj
13. Abdula Khaled, originally from Yemen, received BH citizenship, was resident of Bocinja, Maglaj
14. Aref Mestrovac, originally from Lebanon, received BH citizenship, was resident of Bocinja, Maglaj
15. Ali Saidi Muhamed, BH citizen, resident of Bocinja, Maglaj; purchased house from Serb resident
16. Ben Hamza Mourad, born 1972 in Sudan, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
17. Ben Radhia Nejmedine, born 1968 in Egypt, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
18. Ben Ina Khalifa Ben, born in Tunisia, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
19. Cshoumani Ousama, born 1968 in Jordan, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
20. Cakir Fahri, born in Turkey, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
21. Dar Khalifeh Jafar, born 1973 in Jordan, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj; now reported as resident in Brcko
22. Eslam Durmo, born 1964 in Egypt, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Old Town municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
23. El Wakil Ahmed, born 1971 in Egypt, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Old Town municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
24. El Hassiny Gamal, born 1962 in Egypt, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Old Town municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj

25. El Monsoury Mohamed, born 1966 in Egypt, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Old Town municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
26. Essindar Abdulah, born 1964 in Yemen, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
27. El Karim Mohamed Ahmed, born 1971 in Sudan, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
28. El Guerhani Fatima, [woman] born in Yemen, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Novo Sarajevo municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
29. El Hachini Muhamed, born in Qatar, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-New Town municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
30. Ejman Abu Abdulrrahman, Syrian, age approx. 40, former medical student in FR Yugoslavia. According to Federation[-based] weekly “Dani,” of 16 December 1988 [sic – means 1998], Abdulrrahman had been an active member of “El-mujahid” from its inception, fighting in theaters around Kacun, Vitez, Zabrdje and Travnik [central Bosnia]. He had terrorist training in the Mehurici camp. Married to a Bosniak woman, he claims to have BH citizenship.

31. Fridhi Sami, born 1969 in Jordan, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
32. Fawzi Lordijane, originally from Lebanon, has BH citizenship, was resident of Bocinja, Maglaj
33. Fayez Souidane, originally from Lebanon, has BH citizenship, was resident of Bocinja, Maglaj
34. Gamal El Hassiny, citizen of BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA, resident in Bocinja, Maglaj, bought the house from a Serb
35. Hmaity Moh’d, born 1961 in UA Emirates, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
36. Hans Kreis, born 1959 in Luxembourg, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
37. Hamza Hasamudin, a.k.a. Abu Hamza, Palestinian, married to a Bosniak from Kozarac, Prijedor; father of two. In a statement for Federation[-based] weekly “Dani,” dated 16 February [sic] 1998, confirmed he was an active member of “El-Mujahid,” and that his BH citizenship was regulated on those grounds.
38. Hassan Ashraf, originally from Egypt, has BH citizenship, was resident of Bocinja, Maglaj
39. Hanchi Ammar, born 1965 in Djibouti, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Old Town municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
40. Imad Muhamad Al-Husein, born 1963 in Syria, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
41. Ibrahim Hosni, born 1961 in Egypt, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
42. Ismad Al Husein, a.k.a. Abu Hamza, Islamic mercenary; formerly resident of Bocinja, he received a large sum of money from the Federal [BH] Ministry for refugees and displaced persons in order to obtain housing in Sarajevo.
43. Inal Salih, originally from Turkey, has BH citizenship, was resident of Bocinja, Maglaj
44. Khaled Barakat, has BH citizenship, resident of Bocinja, Maglaj; bought the house from a Serb;
45. Khalil Hodzic, born 1972 in Sudan, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
46. Jedari Salih, born 1965 in South Yemen,received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
47. Kamel Rahala, born in Algeria, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
48. Kreis Magdalina, [woman] born 1958 in Switzerland, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
49. Kaled Al Safani, a.k.a. Sulejman,originally from Yemen, has BH citizenship;Expelled from Kuwait for links with notorious Islamic terrorist Osama Bin Laden; Resided in Bocinja; Indicated as one of the leaders in a Zenica-Doboj Canton car-theft ring, along with Ali Said Baawr, a.k.a. Hudeifa.
50. Maati Gamal, has BH citizenship, resident of Bocinja, Maglaj; bought the house from a Serb
51. Metwali Mamdouh, born 1967 in Egypt, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Old Town municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
52. Morsy Rokaya, born in Egypt, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
53. Mohamed Begovic, originally from Tunisia, has BH citizenship, and resided in Bocinja, Maglaj; however, filed a change of residence with the Maglaj police;
54. Nabil Kal Bi, originally from Tunis, has BH citizenship; and resided in Bocinja, Maglaj; however, filed a change of residence with the Maglaj police;
55. Omar Badjaouvi, born in Sudan, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Novo Sarajevo municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
56. Pranvera Bardhosi, originally from Albania, has BH citizenship, was resident of Bocinja, Maglaj
57. Ridha Labidi, originally from Tunisia, resided in Bocinja, Maglaj; however, he filed a change of residence with the Maglaj police;
58. Raja Bargaoui, originally from Tunisia, resided in Bocinja, Maglaj; however, he filed a change of residence with the Maglaj police;
59. Skuorac El Aret, born 1971 in Egypt, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
60. Shela Marvana, [woman] originally from Albania, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
61. Zrigwe Homouda, born 1955 in Tunisia, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
62. Zubeir Behchic, born in the UA Emirates, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj
63. Querghi Mustapha, born 1961 in Tunisia, received citizenship based on fictitious residence in Sarajevo-Center municipality, then moved to Bocinja, Maglaj

NOTE: It has been continually noted in the media that Mirsada Zutic-Beganovic, executive at the Sarajevo Canton MIA, on 28 December 1995 approved BH citizenship for 103 persons of African or Asian origin. Facsimiles of the list and approval decisions have been published. At the time, the superintendent of the Sarajevo SSC was Enes Bezdrop, and the Federal Minister of Internal Affairs was Bakir Alispahic.

[Translator’s Note: Names of the Mujaheddin seem to reflect entries in forms, as they do not seem to follow any spelling convention. Most likely, the names were entered by Bosnian officials with dubious literacy in English or French, the languages likely found in the applicants’ passports. Following the former Yugoslav bureaucratic convention, BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA officials in several cases entered the family name before the given name, eg: numbers 29, 43, 50, 63, etc.]

[1] Most Islamic extremists received the BH citizenship at the time when the Federation BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA Ministry of Internal Affairs was led by Bakir Alispahic, and the Canton MIA by Ismet Dahic. Superintendent of the SSC Sarajevo was Reuf Jahic, with the involvement of Samir Rizvo, currently head of the Felonies department of the Sarajevo Canton MIA. Also involved in issuing identity documents to the Mujaheddin were Mugdim Vranac, Visoko police superintendent, and Asmir Hodzic, manager of the city cemetery in Visoko.

15. Osama bin Laden’s Technological Bosnian Balkan Bridge Linking it to America and Abroad from Bosnia and Herzegovina

In 1995, bin Laden and other members of Al-Qaeda began acquiring a network of satellite telephones to avoid detection. They also underwent and received sophisticated computer training. Since 1996 it is known that they have been capable of forwarding terrorist information about their ongoing Jihad (or holy war) to Al-Qaeda members worldwide. And then by 1997 Al-Qaeda became so sophisticated that they were frequently communicating with encryption devices able to evade many of the most advanced intercepts. The group even had certain (Muslim) members who specialized in making false passports and in also allowing Al-Qaeda members to travel freely around the world-thus enabling Al Qaeda member to travel freely around the world under a variety of different false identifies according to trial evidence.

The Al-Qaeda network is also horizontally widespread globally. According to some indicators, its tentacles stretch even as far as South America and perhaps even into Australia. In addition of using the Internet for exchanging information, orders and instructions, it is further suspected that Al-Qaeda had tried operating computer systems against the United States NSA global surveillance system Echelon.

Documents found recently have casted a new light on the financial infrastructure of Al-Qaeda as well as on its terrorist training cells including its usage of weaponry of mass destruction. There is also recent reasonable suspicion that Osama bin Laden could reach, more easily then previously thought, nuclear "dirty" bombs and similar styed nuclear weapons of mass destruction, particularly those,probably sold to him from Iran. Mamdouh Salim, a key Bin Laden associate who authorized, Fatwahs or (Islamic legal rulings justifying attacks) by al Qaida against civilians, even admitted participating in such efforts that would clearly ensure purchase of certain nuclear and chemical weapons for Al-Qaeda. This person even tried to murder a corrections officer in a Federal Jail located in New York State while awaiting trial for his alleged participation in a conspiracy to kill American nationals. Several months prior to his arrest in Germany, Salim used to travel to Bosnia in 1998 where both his VISA and needed housing were sponsored by the "Benevolence International Foundation "—A so-called charitable organization based in Palos Hills, Ill and recently closed by the FBI under accusations that this charity occupied in providing support to various key terrorist persons and Al-Qaeda groups involved in military and terrorist activities ..

The Al-Qaeda network has been carefully constructed for many years, especially in the United States. Everything that could not be done by the variant intelligence services of Islamic countries, who regard the United States as their worst enemy (Iran in particular) was done in a roundabout way by destroying the basic tenets of an American democracy, by using human naiveté, strong emotions in addition to usage of propaganda to instigate great American compassion for Islamic sufferings abroad, especially within and regarding Palestine. Humanitarian NGOs were also carefully (wisely) established by leaders of Al-Qaeda in all the major United States cities. A group of Iranians arrested in 2001 at the Los Angeles International Airport collected between five and ten thousand U.S. dollars daily for so-called aid to the suffering Iranian children.

According to the FBI, this money wasn’t collected for mere charitable intentions, but rather for purely terrorist purposes. Furthermore, the United Nations has allowed many Al-Qaeda terrorists to masquerade under a cloak of decency by actually providing the terrorist agency with actually cold-hard cash, which could then thereafter be used to fund variant terrorist crimes.The United Nations donated money to Muwafaq for so-called "Promoting educational and social development programmers…" in Sudan. The U.N. also donated more than $1.4 million of U.S. Dollars to a consortium of Islamic Charities working in the Sudan in 1997. One of the members was the Muwafaq meaning in the true Arabic, "Blessed relief foundation." According to U.N. Treasury officials, this very charity was used by Al-Qaeda cells in order to/for transfer of literally millions of dollars to Bin Laden. The United States Treasury itself strongly believes that wealthy Islamic businessman Yasin al-Qadi set up the initial charity. Subsequently it was closed during an initial post Spetember 11th crackdown after the terrorist attacks upon tht two World Trade Center buildings. During the September 11th plane attacks on the World Trade Center buildings, it was elucidated that Al-Qaida's assets were among those frozen by the Treasury for possessing alleged links to terrorism.

Practical example You can find in:

16. REPORT ON ILLEGAL FINANCIAL ACTIVITIES AND TERRORISM FINANCING ON THE TERRITORY OF THE FEDERATION OF BOSNIA I HERZEGOVINA PART I/I/ABIHBQ – 08/2003 by JEAN-CHARLESBRISARD, LEAD INVESTIGATOR, 911 LAWSUIT :

“Bosnian banks Vakufska Banka D.D. and Depozitna Banka D.D. have supported, facilitated and participated in terrorism financing on the territory of Bosnia Herzegovina. These banks were funded by two SDGT, Yasin Al Kadi and Chafiq Ayadi, along with a Saudi-controlled offshore company based in the Isle of Man, whose main shareholder is a member of the Saudi royal family, nephew of King Fahd and son of the Saudi Deputy Minister of Interior. Other shareholders of the banks have also supported terrorism in the past. The bank has provided financial support to several organizations acting as fronts for Al-Qaida, including Muwafaq Foundation, Al Haramain Islamic Foundation and the Saudi High Commission for Relief in Bosnia Herzegovina, some of which have already been designated as SDGT by the US Government.”

In further text, we are going to let you know some details from this REPORT / Following lines bellow will enlight some interesting details from REPORT above.

“Vakufska Banka D.D. (aka Vakufska Bank) is registered in Sarajevo,          Bosnia & Herzegovina, with an address at Ferhadija 2, 71000, Sarajevo, Tel: +387 71 470903, Fax: +387 71 2005971. The bank was founded in 1992 in Sarajevo, and is currently chaired by Amir Rizvanovic, serving as General Director. Vakufka Banka has 70 employees and maintains several branches in Bosnia & Herzegovina (Zenica, Mostar, Bihac…) and banking correspondents in several European countries (Italy, Germany, Belgium…).

In 2002, Vakufska Banka reported a capital of 16.4 million KM ($9,300,000 US), while its total assets raise 55,920,000 KM ($28,670,000 US) for the same year.

In August 2002 the Bosnian Federal Banking Agency authorized the merge of Vakufska Banka and Depozitna Banka.

Depozitna Banka D.D. was a private bank owned by Yasin al Kadi (44.3%) and Mahmal Investments Company based in the Isle of Man (44.2%). The entity was under Bosnian and foreign investigation for years. The official documentation dated 2000 from Depozitna Banka D.D., based in Vrazova 9, Sarajevo, and shows that Yasin al Kadi was the first shareholder of the bankalso the mayor one in the same time.

The shareholding structure of Depositna Banka D.D., in December 31, 2000 (Before merging with Vakufska Banka D.D.), was as follows:

Name of shares held                                         Percentage

Yasin Kadi                                                           44.3%

Mahmal Invest Co Limited                                44.2%

BH Banka Sarajevo                                          2.4%                                                                                       

BH Osiguranje                                     2.1%

Centralexport Sarajevo                                     1.3%

Since October 2001, Yasin al Kadi (aka Yassin Qadi, Yasin al-Qadi), 47,is labeled by the U.S. Treasury, as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist (SDGT) and his assets are frozen in the U.S. and Europe. Yasin al Kadi is at the center of various financings through his company “Qadi International” and financial activities in the Balkans.

Even if he is still unconfined in Saudi Arabia, where he resides, Yasin al Kadi is one of the six directors of Muwafaq Humanitarian Organization, an organization that provided assistance to the Al-Qaida network. In June 1998, Yasin al Kadi is named/mentioned, referred to in FBI report on money laundering charges at the profit/to the benefiting of Hamas, a terrorist organization.

Muhammad, Chafiq Ayadi (Aka. Ayadi Shafiq, Ben Muhammad; Aka. Ayadi Chafik, Ben Muhammad; Aka. Aiadi, Ben Muhammad; Aka. Aiady, Ben Muhammad), (01/21/63 Safais, Tunisia), took part in activities of Depozitna Banka and became in 1996 co-owner of Depozitna Banka in Sarajevo. Chafiq Ayadi is a Tunisian national but as well a holder of a Bosnian citizenship. Chafiq Ayadi was a business associate of Yasin al Kadi.

Chairman of Muwafak Foundation in Zagreb, Croatia, Chafiq Ayadi is on the list of Specially Designated Global Terrorists, pursuant to Executive Order 13224. In April 1996, a sum of USD 500,000 was transferred to the SKB account of Bin Muhamad Chafiq Ayadi by a Saudi national, Salem Bin Mahfouz (believed to be Khalid Bin Salem Bin Mahfouz). Chafiq Ayadi became the majority owner of Depozitna Banka on July 27, 1995. Recently, Chafiq Ayadi accounts have been investigated by Croatian financial police on terrorism charges. While Chafiq Ayadi was the co-owner of Depozitna Banka, he transferred through the bank DM 2.5 millions to the account of the Muwafaq Foundation. Furthermore, Chafiq Ayadi became also co-owner of Euroinvest D.O.O. in Sarajevo, which shared the same address as Depozitna Banka. The second co-owner of Euroinvest D.O.O. used to be Yasin al-Kadi, who was also co-owner of Depozitna Banka and became co-owner of Vakufska Banka. Chafiq Ayadi left Depozitna Banka in September 2000. He sold his shares to Yasin al Kadi. On March 30, 2001, the Banking Agency rescinded the Depozitna Banka’s permit, and the bank merged with Vakufska Banka.

Euroinvest D.O.O., based in Bosnia with an address at Ulica Armije BH bb, 75264 Lukavac, was one of the most regular provider of Al Haramain Al Masjed Al Aqsa charitable foundation during the 2000-2001 period.

Based on al-Kadi's previous shares in "Depozitna Banka", he should have earned 20% of the shares of Vakufska Banka, nominally worth 3.2 million KM ($1,815,000 US). According to intelligence sources, Yasin al Kadi is still co-owner of Vakufska Banka through another Sarajevo front company. Certainly he was already the main shareholder into Depozitna Banka when the entity merged with Vakufska Banka.

During the years, Depozitna Banka and then, Vakufska Banka, were owned by Saudi businessman Yasin Al Kadi, who is under US investigation for terrorism charges and by a Saudi shadow company called Mahmal Investment Company, currently under Bosnian investigation by the FOSS, Financial Police and Federal Banking Agency.

Moreover, according to the official registry of Vakufska Banka shareholders, El Tarik Oil D.O.O., an oil company based in Sarajevo, was also shareholder with 8% of Vakufska Banka capital in year 2000. Another documented report from the Bosnian Financial Police indicates in 2002 that El Tarik Oil D.O.O. is a regular provider for the Saudi High Commission and al Haramain al Aqsa foundation in Sarajevo, both involved in logistical support to al-Qaida.

Finally, among the Vakufska Banka shareholders also stands a foundation called “Fondacija Bosnjaci Mostar” and “Rijaset Islamke Zajednice”, their shares are respectively 18% and 11% in year 2000. Both foundations receive donations from abroad, and particularly from Saudi Arabia.

Nezim Halilovic Muderis, director of Wakf Directorate of the BiH Islamic Community, responsible for these foundations, is a preacher at the Sarajevo King Fahd Bin Abdulaziz Al Saud Mosque.

Rijaset Islamke Zajednice, or Islamic Community of Bosnia Herzegovina publishes the monthly “Preporod” (Renaissance). In one of its issues in May 1992, the newspaper stressed the “virtues of the Islamic warefare” to the fighters for the independent and multinational Bosnia and Herzegovina, advising them “to purify themselves so that they couldfeed on the Divine spring”. In the text entitled “We feel no fear”, Preporod gave these pieces of advice in a text which looks remarkably similar to Mohamed Atta’s last instructions to the September 11 hijackers:

“Set out to the battle with pure intentions and full confidence in Allah - if you survive, you will become heroes; if you are killed, you will be martyrs, otherwise - you will lose both and be humiliated; if possible, start off with ablutions, but always with God's name in your heart and on your lips; you must never leave unwashed (after nocturnal emission or marital intercourse) for such person could cause adversity both to himself and others; during your assault at or confrontations with the enemy, utter the cries "Allah ekber!"; if possible, carry the Koran with you”.

The shareholding structure of Vakufska Banka for years 2000 (before merger) and 2001 (post merger) was the following (note that total percentage does not equal 100%):

Name  % of shares in 2000      % of shares in 2001

Individual

investors                       29%                             36.6%

Mahmal

Investment

Co Limited                   -                                   21.1%

Fondacija Bosnjaci

Mostar                         18%                             8.8%

Finance Ministry           74%                             6.9%

Rijaset Islamske

Zajednice BiH 11%                             5.1%

Tarik El Oil d.o.o.

Sarajevo                       8%                                               -

“According to a sworn statement filed by FBI Special Agent Robert Wright, BMI “had receive financing from [Yassin Kadi] and United States designated HAMAS terrorist [Musa abu Marzook].” In October 2001, the U.S. Treasury Department froze the assets of Yassin Kadi and listed him as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist, citing his financial support for Al-Qaeda through a “relief” organization called Muwafaq, or Blessed Relief. Agent Wright had initially investigated BMI as part of an ongoing Hamas fundraising investigation in the United States. According to an Affidavit filed by Wright, Yassin Kadi put up $820,000 for a real estate deal structured to funnel proceeds to Hamas operative Mohammed Salah.

And :

“But by then, it was hardly a secret that BIF was involved in more than just charitable activities. The entity openly advertised itself in its Arabic-language fundraising appeals as a “trustworthy hand for the support of [both] the mujahideen and refugees” in Bosnia. Similarly, documents taken from BIF’s U.S.-based offices in December 2001 included handwritten Arabic notations explaining that its headquarters in Croatia was established “for relief operations and support of jihad in Bosnia-Herzegovina… Contribute with your mujahideen brothers to repel the Crusader-Zionist attack on Muslim lands.” Another handwritten note found in Illinois by investigators revealed BIF’s supreme “unwritten law”: “no matter how poor/sick – first priority is for mujahideen.” The raid of BIF’s Illinois office also turned up a number of other documents directly related to the war in Bosnia: a receipt dated July 21. 1994. from the “Black Swans” Bosnian Muslim commando brigade for 300 blankets and 200 pairs of boots obtained from BIF; a receipt from the BiH army dated      June 3. 1994. for 2.000 uniforms, 2.000 pairs of shoes, and ten “mass communication stations” donated by BIF to “this military unit”; a request dated December 31.1994. from the Bosnian military for a combat ambulance (later delivered as promised in January 1995);and, a memorandum to BIF director Enaam Arnaout dated November 17.1995. describing the recent contribution of 200 tents to the Muslim army. In an interview conducted in 1992, BIF founder Adel Batterjee denied that his brainchild was actively encouraging its employees to aid or join the militant mujahideen operating in the Balkans; however, he also nonetheless added, “if a relief worker decides that he wants to join the fighting forces, we would not stop him.”

17. Why the United States have Reasons to Worry?

Associated Press reported on

"...NATO authorities who raided a Saudi aid agency last fall found computer files containing photographs of terrorist targets and street maps of Washington with government buildings marked, a senior U.S. official disclosed Thursday…The newspaper continued that…

"…The October raid of the Sarajevo office of the Saudi High Commissioner for Aid to Bosnia also netted a computer program explaining how to use crop duster aircraft to spread pesticide, and materials used to make fake U.S. State Department identification badges and credit cards, the official told The Associated Press, speaking on condition of anonymity."

In mentioning/references from the Saudi High Commissioner for Aid to Bosnia, it must be taken into account that the Saudi rulers have been well known for transferring huge sums of money to this particular "charitable" agency. Over the past nine years, the agency alone has spent approximately $600million U.S. dollars for its "activities" within Bosnia. The money came from various donations made by certain prominent Saudi businessmen and also from certain Saudi governmental grants.

Equally sad and ironic is a fact that King Fahd personally contributed the sum of $34 million U.S. dollars to the agency now known for being affiliated with Al-Qaeda’s activities of terrorism. It is also crystals clear that not all the money was yet used for whichever humanitarian purposes at all, but rather for something much more sinister which evidently is Osama bin Laden’s Bosnian Al-Qaeda network of "charities."

Daniel Benjamin, director of Transnational Threats located at the National Security Council during the Clinton Administration, said Al-Qaeda was also using "charities" including several named: Maktab Khidmat or "Services Bureau", as well as another called Mercy International Relief Organization. These charities were also used by the terrorists for relaying messages and funding for its operations.

Now, Bosnian authorities too, are conducting intense investigations of connections between Benevolence International Foundation of Palos Hills, Ill. and Mr. Hadz Boudella, "a charity worker" recently arrested (October 2001) in Sarajevo. Afterward he was turned over to the U.S. authorities who transported him to Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. Apparently Boudella worked for Benevolence International in Zenica between 1992 through 1994 and is believed to be connected to Abu Al-Me'Ali, the leader of a unit of Islamic fighters in Zenica. Boudella was also working closely with another "Islamic charity" called "Human Appeal International" in the period of his arrest, according to his wife Nadja Dizdarevic. Apparently, when Boudella and many others were handed over to the U.S. anti-terrorist forces this past January, the American authorities said they also suspected Boudella’s involvement with two Islamic militant groups--Algeria's Armed Islamic Group and Egypt's al-Gama'a al Islamiyya. Boudella came to Bosnia in 1992 and he claimed that he wanted to perform humanitarian work with an organization called Al Bir, Dizdarevic as stated by Mr. Al Bir Al. "Dawalia" is the Arabic translation meaning "Benevolence International Foundation" according to an FBI affidavit from Chicago.

The Global Relief Foundation was located in Bridgeview and the Benevolence International Foundation in Palos Hills ,the two were scrutinized over by a fine tooth comb by the American FBI whose spokeswoman Ebony Harrel said:

"The head of one of the nation's largest Muslim charities was charged with allegedly lying about his involvement with Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaida network of terror. In a 35-page criminal complaint, the government contends that Enaam M. Arnaout and the Benevolence International Foundation supported bin Laden operatives who were searching for nuclear and chemical materials and plotting terrorist strikes around the world."

Mr. Ennam Arnaout launched Benevolence's operations from Bosnia / Herzegovina during 1992 and ostensibly, to distribute relief supplies to both civilians and soldiers. He was eventually granted Bosnian citizenship (February 8th 1996). His passport is among 300 issued between 1995 and 1996 that Bosnian authorities are now investigating as to determine whether they were handled properly. The complaint alleges that Arnaout had very close ties with Osama bin Laden and his top aides dating back to the 1980s when the Syrian-born naturalized American was living in Pakistan. In other words, during 1989, bin Laden asked Arnaout to take care of one of his wives at his home in Pakistan until he could pick her up according to certain governmental officials. Arnaout also was an administrator for bin Laden, distributing funds on his behalf according to a confidential witness now cooperating with the Bosnian government. The complaint also alleges that the foundation sponsored the man’s false VISA and also paid for his housing in Bosnia and also for the other man, Mamdouh Salim, another vital key bin Laden associate. Salim allegedly approved the purchase of uranium required for production of nuclear weapons. The initial Al-Qaeda operative ordered to carry out the purchase of this uranium, Mohamed Bayazid, used the foundation's address in Illinois to obtain a driver's license according to the complaint. Salim was later arrested in Germany (1998) and is currently awaiting trial in New York City on charges of conspiring with bin Laden and al-Qaida to kill U.S. citizens.

“In the New York area, BIF was represented by a senior Bosnian diplomat and “Minister Counsellor” at the Bosnian Mission to United Nations in Manhattan: Saffet Abid Catovic. Since 1993, Catovic has been a prominent charitable fundraiser for the Balkans and an outspoken voice at the UN mission on Islamic religious and political issues. He has had a close relationship with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and, in interviews in 1994, he publicly thanked the Saudis for their generous financial assistance to Bosnian religious projects. However, he has since noted: “there was no way to do wire transfers into Bosnia; it had to be physically carried—the funds had to be physically carried in to give the people, uh, financial help… it’s not unusual.” Given his fundamentalist activism in the northeastern United States, it is clear that Catovic was also using his position to advocate “holy struggle” against the opponents of radical Islam, including inside the United States. Testifying in Immigration court, Catovic denied supporting the blind Shaykh Omar Abdel Rahman (head of the Egyptian Al-Gama`at Al-Islamiyya terror organization) but nonetheless added, “I admire his recitation of the Koran… [h]e’s a blind man who recites Koran very beautifully.” During his testimony, Catovic also admitted that he indeed has met Ramadan Abdullah Shallah, the current General Secretary of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), “once or twice” at terrorist fundraising conferences held in the United States by the Tampa-based Islamic Committee for Palestine (ICP).New York police who arrested El Sayyid Nosair, the assassin of militant Jewish leader Meir Kahane and co-conspirator in the February 1993 World Trade Center bombing, found Saffet Catovic’s business card from the New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation amongst Nosair’s personal effects. In a videotaped theological lecture published by an Islamic media outlet in New Jersey, Catovic introduced Siddig Ali (also later convicted of a central role in a fundamentalist conspiracy to bomb New York landmarks in 1993) to speak on the subject of “Jihad: The Forgotten Duty.” Catovic offered heartfelt praise of Siddig, and told his camera audience that they should feel “honored to have our dear brother from Sudan, a land which is participating in the Jihad in the struggle itself, and by the mercy of Allah, has almost succeeded in gaining that victory totally and completely.” Siddig Ali ordered to his followers amongst viewers:

“If the Da`wa [Islamic Call] is confronted, anybody, anywhere, by any power, then the sword is to be absolutely used and implemented… But let’s come back to our Muslims that are with us today and Brother Saffet just showed us today a video of what is going on today in Muslim Bosnia. What happened to our involvement as Muslims, to attack the core of this disease? …Allah (SWT) warned us in the Qur`an when he said, ‘O you who believe, what is the matter with you, that when it is time that you are asked to go forth to fight in the cause of Allah, you cling heavily to the earth? …As if we came back from our respective countries with the same defeatist mentality, that we cannot announce and pronounce these ayat [verses] of Jihad… because we are still afraid that the CIA or the FBI or the authorities or countries are going to be behind us… [and we do not] confront the kuffar [infidels] who has taken our own sisters, our brothers, as slaves in Bosnia.” It is, of course, fundamentally significant that Catovic, a senior official at BIF (an organization now officially recognized by the U.S. government as an Al-Qaida terrorist front group), had such a close relationship with Siddig Ali, one of the lead conspirators in the 1993 New York terror plots.

On November 24.2000,the Dorral Forrestal Conference Center in Princeton, New Jersey hosted a three-day local Muslim “spiritual retreat.” One of the speakers at the event was Saffet Catovic, whose lecture was titled “Political and Social Jihad.”In an article about the retreat,the author explained, “Brother Saffet Catovic has been active in the Bosnian Jihad for many years.” Between August 20-26, 2001, Catovic was a featured invitee and speaker at a “Jihad Camp” organized for Muslim men between the ages of 14 and 25, sponsored by the northeast regional branch of the “Young Muslims of North America.” Though there was no explicit mention of any martial purpose, the flyer was printed in camouflage colors and the text was in military-style block print. The conference registration form began with a quote from the Qur`an: “Jihad is ordained for you (Muslims) though you dislike it, and it may be that you dislike something which is good for you and that you like something which is bad for you. Allah knows but you do not know.” One of the other lecturers at the Jihad Camp (who has teamed up with Catovic at many other speaking events) was Imam Siraj Wahaj, a radical African-American Muslim cleric, listed by U.S. Attorney Mary Jo White in 1995 as an “unindicted person who may be alleged as [a] conspirator” in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.

Another search conducted on (December 16th 2001) at a Benevolence International Foundation office in Newark, N.J., according to Dean Boyd, spokesman for the U.S. Customs Service said that the group claiming to be an "Islamic Charity", is cooperating with FBI officials and said:

"It's part of a higher level of scrutiny of all Muslim relief organizations.''

It is important to underline that Safet Catovic are also more members of AID (The Secret Service of Bosnian Muslims). During this same time no report was uncovered by FBI Officials stating that any proof was his possession regarding his true identity accept for a U.N. badge which manifested outwardly that he was apparently a Minister Counsellor at the Bosnia Mission to the United Nations.

His ID had apparently expired (October 31st 2003). Until today there is no explanation as to whereby Catovic had simultaneously been both a charity worker and also a Bosnian UN Mission Diplomat. That question still lingers! Furthermore, Catovic organized an active Jihad Camp in Pennsylvania very close by to a place where one of planes crashed on September 11th 2001. This Jihad Camp was held only one month prior to the September 11th 2001 terrorist attack on America between (August 20 to 26th 2001).

At the same time as the Illinois searches, two Global Relief Foundation offices that were located in the Former Yugoslavia parts of Bosnia and Kosovo were also investigated/searched over by NATO-led peacekeepers and also their associated U.N. police. A NATO spokesman said three people were detained there but gave no additional details. The monetary / financial asset holdings of both these groups are now frozen by the U.S. Treasury Department said State Department spokesman Tony Fratto. He also stated that since "Early Saturday there was coordinated actions to block the assets because the groups are both suspected of funding terrorist activities.''

Officials said the Chicago searches were conducted by the U.S. Treasury Department, the FBI and the U.S. Customs Department and the actual Search Warrants themselves were sealed. Fratto cited the Patriot Act signed on (October 26th 2001) by U.S. President George Bush which gives federal agents much broader powers to detain immigrants, eavesdrop on telephone calls and look at emails. The Act also gives Officials new powers to actively share anti-terrorist sensitive informational details of all and any ongoing criminal investigations with the CIA. Moreover, U.S. President George Bush Jr. on (11/7/01) stated:

 "We put the world's financial institutions on notice: if you do business with terrorists, if you support them or sponsor them, you will not do business with the United States of America."

Additionally, September 28th 2001, the U.N. adopted a new Security Council Resolution 1363 (2001). This instructs UN member States to take all and every of the necessary steps to freeze the financial funds of entities and/or persons suspected of committing, and/or posing significant risks of committing, or providing material support for any future acts of terrorism.

The NATO statements regarding the recent raids on the Islamic Global Relief offices in Yugoslavia, said UN Peacekeepers and U.N. police had received credible information that Global Relief may have been directly involved in supporting terrorism. On Sunday December 16th 2001, Federal agents raided the Bridgeview offices of another Islamic charity called, "The Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development." Authorities said this new Texas based charity is believed to be a front for raising money for Islamic Al-Qaeda terrorist groups such as Hammas.

17-1. Sead Jakup, Bosnian Muslim wanted to set the temple ablaze in New York-2003

The Pakistani immigrant said he watched in disbelief as Sead Jakup, 22, took the canister across the street and began dousing the Young Israel of Kings Bay synagogue. Ali quickly called 911, and cops arrived before Jakup, a Bosnian Muslim, could set the temple ablaze.

"Mr. Ali saved the shul [synagogue]," said Allen Popper, president of the synagogue. "He's a hero." Ali said that Jakup first asked to pump gas into a plastic bucket. Assuming the man's car had run out of fuel, Ali gave him a gas can to fill up. He said he couldn't believe his eyes when Jakup marched straight to the synagogue.

"I saw him spilling gas on the sign in front of the synagogue," Ali said. "Then, he started spilling it onto the door - that is when I called 911."

18. Back to Bosnia’s Linkages to Al-Qaeda

All Mujahahedin’s allegedly claiming to be born within Bosnia has declared themselves as "humanitarian workers" or holders of some form of a diplomatic passport. Most of them however were found out later to be merely plain members members of extremist Islamic groups such as: Al-Gama’a al Islamiyya, Hamas, GIA....Hezbolah....etc.. All of their basic operational needs have been apparently covered by a network of many of these so similar-like so-called "Islamic charities" such as the Benevolence Intonations Foundation and the Global Relief Found...all of these terrorist charitable organizations primarily had at least some form of their headquarters in both the United States and also some had their headquarters also in another Islamic Country.

The names of following persons are of those who received money from the aforementioned "charities" in the form of so-called "humanitarian aid" which they later "donated" to the high military command of the militant Mujaheddin groups located outside of America which used the money for waging Jihad:

Or for example:

“The involvement of Yasin Al Kadi and Chafiq Ayadi in both Depositna Banka and Vakufska Banka with the financial backing of Mahmal Investment Co. Limited, has provided for years a financial arm/aid to Islamic charities and terrorist organizations operating in Bosnia Herzegovina. In 2002, an intelligence report from the Bosnian Intelligence Services (AID- Agency for investigation and Documentation) revealed the active role of Vakufska Banka D.D. in terrorism funding. Indeed, AID described Vakufska Banka D.D. and the merged Depozitna Banka D.D., as a financial platform assisting al Haramain Islamic Foundation and al-Qaeda activities:

"The HO (al Haramain) spent around 13,000,000 KM ($7,647,000) between its foundation in 1997 and the end of last year2000. Financial transactions were through accounts at the Depozit[na] Bank, now the Vakufska Bank, whose major shareholders have been linked with PIS operating illegal money laundering".

The Bosnian Intelligence memo regarding the activities of Al Haramain states the following:

"Given all the above security factors, we believe that the clear lack of any concrete humanitarian projects indicates that the existence of this HO [Humanitarian Organization] was a fictitious cover (...)"

The report establishes Al Haramain role in financing and assisting Osama Bin Laden operations:

"Saudi HO [Humanitarian Organization] Al Haramain, (...) has acted as a channel for financing the activities of terrorist organizations. (...) According to available intelligence, the Sarajevo office assisted the terrorist organization Gama Al Islamija, while members of Bin Laden's El Itihad al Islamija (AIAI) terrorist groups were employed at the Somalia offices, which also financed their operations."

In March 2002, during the Anti-terrorism operations in Bosnia, the new Vakufska Banka's director, Amir Rizvanovic recognized that Al Haramain was an active client of Vakufska Banka, while Nurudin Kusturica (bank's director for nine years) left the bank since the discovery that a former co-owner of Depozitna Banka and current co-owner of Vakufska Banka was on the list of SDGT for supporting terrorism.

Sulejman Vranj is a Bosnian Army Brigadier General and the former chief of the Personnel Office of the BH Federation Army's Joint Command. On February 2,2002, US General John Sylvester, as SFOR Commander, banned General Vranj to work in any military service "because of his participation in protests during the extradition of the Algerian Group to the US". The Algerian group was part of Al-Qaeda, and since then, General Vranj has been engaged in the Board of directors of Vakufska Banka. Additionally, according to Bosnian Financial Police documentation, Vakufska Banka is involved in terrorism financing through financial transactions between the Saudi High Commission for Relief and a company named Engra, managed by Balta Edin.

Balta Edin (son of Muharem), born on 12/30/1964 in Sarajevo, and residing in Sarajevo, director of the firm "Engra," D.O.O., Zenica, submitted false information about legally earned income of the firm in 1998, 1999, and 2000, of the income that he, as the firm's representative, personally received in cash from a customer at the foreign humanitarian organization Saudi High Commission for Relief.

These money laundering transactions were operated between Engra D.O.O. headed by Balta Edin and the Saudi High Commission for Relief, convicted to funnel money to al-Qaeda operatives in Bosnia, and Vakufska Banka.

From 1998 to 2000, Engra D.O.O. conducted financial transactions on behalf of an organization linked to UBL through the following bank accounts: account 1604205500000502, opened with DD "Vakufska Banka," Sarajevo, Zenica Branch and account 1602000000869046 (from 04/08/2002), opened with DD "Depozitna Banka" Sarajevo.

For years, either Depozitna Banka or Vakufska Banka have been associated with the funding of Islamic projects in BiH.

According to the report by the Bosnian Ambassador to the UN, Mirza Kusljugic provided to the UN Security Council's Counter-Terrorism Committee (CTC), a special investigation has been conducted in Bosnia to check the funds and assets of suspected individuals and agencies, which led to the freezing of two accounts in Vakufska Banka, the account of a citizen of Saudi Arabia [Yasin al Kadi]which amounted to 3.5 million DM as well as the account of an Investment Company from the Middle East [Mahmal Investment Co. Limited] which also amounted to 3.5 million DM.

Vakufska Banka has several partners in Europe and especially in Turkey, where the Bosnian bank is above all the main correspondent of Al Baraka Turkish Finance House, known to be connected to the Spanish cell of al-Qaida. Mohamed Galeb Kalaje Zouaydi, financial head of al-Qaida in Spain, and financier of the Hamburg cell, transferred to UBL Courier for Europe, Mohamed Baiahah (aka Abu Khaled), $97,000 US on July 2000, through al Baraka Turkish Finance House in Turkey. According to the Spanish police documentation,Muhamed Galeb Kalaje Zouaydi used several times Al Baraka Turkish Finance House to transfer money to al-Qaida operatives.

Regarding the activities of Al Baraka Turkish Finance House in Bosnia, the long-term inquiry conducted by Bosnian intelligence revealed that Al Baraka Bank provided support to Al Haramain operations and helped transfer funds for Osama Bin Laden operations. The Agency for investigation and Documentation - AID - gives further details in a memorandum titled "Some illegal activities of humanitarian organizations investigated by the relevant investigative bodies of the Federation of Bosnia Herzegovina (FBiH)" :

"Records available for 1998 show a flow of money into the so-called "operating" account of the HO [Humanitarian Organization] at the Deposit Bank, Sarajevo, from the "main" account, sent from Saudi Arabia via the Deutsche Bank and the Albaraka Bank in Turkey. The amount is 1,059,687 DEM [$2.13 million US]".

Al Baraka Turkish Finance House, Al Baraka branch in Turkey is a subsidiary of the Dallah Al Baraka group

These and many other similar type Jihad warriors were supported via like "charities" which were mostly located within North America and all involved in some terrorist activities. The United States have great reason to worry. Experts on terrorism claim that the largest act of terrorism ever ,which happened on September 11^th. 2001 could not have been accomplished without at least 100 people involved in its planning. This undoubtedly indicates that the Al-Qaeda network is evidently located comfortably within the United States and has been for many years. Finally, the United States is using its strong allies and associated connections to undertake a war against Al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups like it. This will not be an easy uncomplicated task however.

19. The Structural Characteristics of Al-Qaeda’s Terrorist Network Within the United States Based on Bosnia and Herzegovina’s Osama bin Laden Terrorist Experiences and Lessons Learned the United States can Benefit From.

1. Structurally, the network is consisted of humanitarian organizations, associations and community centers for Muslims living in the US.

2. Non-Muslims were often involved in the aforementioned organizations' operations, providing the cover of multi-ethnicity and concealing the Muslim and Islamic nature of the organizations.

3. In addition to the aforementioned organizations in the US, the network also includes diplomatic channels of some Islamic countries, their secret services and UN missions, whenever diplomatic cover was/is needed. It is important to keep in mind that almost one third of the countries in the world are Islamic states, and their manipulation of the world organization/s represent a genuine threat.

a) The Al-Qaeda network consists of the following committees:

The Western Balkans has been a region of interest to Islamic extremists for decades. Numerous Muslims living in the so-called “Green Traverse” represent both a recruitment pool and a springboard for attacks in Western Europe. Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo and the Raska region (a.k.a. Sanjak) are frequently used as Jihad’s gateway into the European heartland. The notion is not new, only more visible today than ever before.

One tactic the Islamic fanatics implemented in the Western Balkans was population warfare. When Muslims are a minority, they seek to increase their numbers through high birthrates – sometimes ten times those of the non-Muslim populace. Once they attain a majority in a desired territory, they invoke the popular claim of Islamic fanatics: “Allah’s law on Allah’s land”. Thus in mid-1994, the top Bosnian Muslim cleric (Reis-ul-ulema) Mustafa Ceric issued a decree ordering Bosnian Muslim women to bear at least five children.

Studies of Islamic extremists’ activities in Bosnia-Herzegovina and the Balkans in general, their international connections, and the consequences of their political, propaganda and terrorist activities (including war crimes) have provided valuable insights into the global Islamic terror network. According to the available information, the Al-Qaeda network seems to consist of several committees. Every committee is an important link in the chain, engaged at the local, national and international level. International activity includes the recruitment of individuals with substantial political power, which can be used to further Islamic fundamentalist objectives.

The Financial Committee has the task to provide the Network’s funding. Fundraising methods differ from place to place, but rely mainly on accounts directly or indirectly available to Osama Bin Laden and the funds provided through the wide network of “humanitarian organizations” which use their charity as a cover for fundraising and recruitment of future terrorists. This committee is also in charge of money transfers. One of its methods is the “hawala” system, where money and other commodities are transferred directly, without the involvement of banks. Such transactions are virtually impossible to trace. Basic funding derives primarily from the production and distribution of narcotics – specifically heroin, which is produced in Afghanistan, then distributed to Western European and US markets through a sophisticated network. One Kosovo Albanian was recently arrested at the Bajakovo border crossing between Croatia and Serbia-Montenegro, in possession of 48 kg of heroin. By and large, Kosovo Albanians are not Islamic fanatics, but as heroin smugglers, they are an important link in Al-Qaeda’s chain. Profits from the heroin trade are also very difficult to trace.

Funds thus obtained are put to use in pursuit of Islamic fanatics’ darkest aims. Al-Qaeda and other organizations act locally, but think globally. For example, the newly established Islamic terrorist organization, LIVO, whose striking fist is the Uzbekistan Islamic Movement, is pursuing the plan for establishing Islamic states – and eventually, the Caliphate – in Central Asia, funded and aided by the Financial and the Military committees of Al-Qaeda.

The Law and Religion committee focuses on justifying terrorist activities. In conjunction with the Media committee, it promotes the view that everywhere in the world, Muslims are constant victims, and even when they do commit atrocities, those are fully justified as self-defense and righteous Jihad. The ultimate aim is to foment conflict between all Muslims and the rest of the civilized world.

The Media Committee coordinates with the owners of pro-fundamentalist media and activists inside major media outlets to spread Islamic fundamentalist propaganda. The basic function of this Committee is to justify the activities of Islamic fundamentalists. The main weapon is to claim that Muslims are always and everywhere the exclusive victims of violence. Of course, truth is completely different, because the Islamic fundamentalists initiate violence for the purpose of establishment of the pan-Islamic Ummah, a theocracy that excludes the existence of other religions. For example, in Kosovo-Metohia Islamic extremists among the Kosovo Albanians, with Al-Qaeda’s help, have managed to create a perception that the Albanian majority was endangered by the Serb minority. Thanks to the work of the Media Committee, the secession and terrorism of Islamic fundamentalists among the Kosovo Albanians were presented as a “struggle for freedom.” One of the main objectives of the Islamic fundamentalists’ global network is to create a perception in the world public opinion that Muslims are always the victims, in order to justify conflict and conquest. Victim status is thus claimed for Kosovo Albanians, their co-religionists in Kashmir, Palestine, Russia (Chechnya), Sudan, Tanzania, Bosnia, Macedonia, Malaysia, East Timor, etc.

In addition to recruiting and training the Jihadi suicide bombers, the Military Committee also coordinates, plans, and commands terrorist activities throughout the world. It organizes logistical support for the attacks, sets the objectives and maintains communication with terrorist cells, all for the purpose of accomplishing the ultimate objective – a global Islamic state, Ummah, built by jihad and atrocities in the name of Allah. One of the first camps training the members of the global Islamic terror network was in Iran, established by Imam Khomeini personally. The first commander of the camp was Sheik Abbas Golru, a prominent member of the Syrian-run Palestinian terrorist organization al-Saiqa.

The NGO Committee coordinates an entire network of NGOs connected by the shared ideals of Islamic fundamentalism and common funding. These organizations often have names that lack any Islamic identification. The goal of these organizations is to infiltrate the civil society of countries such as the US, UK, France and Italy, but also countries such as Tanzania and Nigeria. These NGOs have many purposes, but the main one is to raise funds for Islamic fundamentalists and influence the public opinion of the host countries. Many of these NGOs are cover for Islamic countries’ intelligence operations. Islamic countries used to have rudimentary intelligence operations, but that situation has changed. They have a defined goal – the creation of the Ummah. They have a defined enemy – all those who do not follow the Koran, non-Muslims, “the infidels.” They have a defined method of struggle – terrorism. This is truly a frightening danger to modern civilization, the one the entire world should be concerned about.

The Government Committee recruits government officials of target nations, contributes financially and otherwise to the campaigns of recruited elected officials, and coordinates with intelligence services of terrorism-sponsoring nations. This Committee pursues the goal of establishing the Ummah by working through government institutions both nationally and internationally. The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) is a typical example of how the Islamic fundamentalist network is protected internationally. The organization has over 60 members, and is currently the strongest international voting bloc in the United Nations.

It is extremely important to note that every committee can function autonomously. The model depicted above is a basic scheme of Al-Qaeda, which is defined as all organizations serving the cause of Islamic extremists. Al-Qaeda does not have a supreme command, but a supreme objective. Its instructions are what the Islamic extremists believe is contained in the Koran. All this makes Al-Qaeda unpredictable. Only observation and analysis of the committees’ actions at all levels can explain the consequences of their activities. After several decades of activity worldwide, it is becoming increasingly clear who finances the terrorists, what sort of global propaganda they employ and with whose assistance, and how entire nations are being demonized at Al-Qaeda’s behest. [Wartime Bosnian Muslim officials] Haris Silajdzic and Muhamed Sacirbey used to pay large sums of money to public relations firms, such as Ruder Finn LLC, to demonize Serbs. It is entirely clear today where this money came from.

20. Funding Al-Qaeda via the Bosnia and Herzegovina Model

Al-Qaeda’s activities throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina have been primarily supported by the following activities:

1) Through Islamic fundamentalist lobbying groups worldwide and especially within the US;

2) Through various so-called "charities" run by actual terrorist Islamic fundamentalist;

Through Islamic countries directly and in particular the states: Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the former Muslim Bosnian Government of which many high ranking officials thereof still are holding their political positions today;

A typical example case which we underline one again is that pertaining to Jusuf Halilagic who was Deputy Minister of Civilian Affaires and Communications of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Mr Jusuf Halilagic, was also formerly the Deputy Commander of the "Bosnian Army" 3rd Corps in charge and command of the Mujaheddin. Thereafter he was transferred to work in the Federal Ministry of Justice after the Dayton peace Accords were signed. According to Muslim news magazine "Slobodna Bosna" Jusuf Halilagic himself in 1992 brought into the country [Bosnia], one particular convoy carrying "humanitarian aid" from Croatia but in actuality was carrying a Mr.Abu Hamza one of the worst and most wanted Islamic fundamentalists alive to date.

Sheikh Omer SAYF from Yamen was one of the religius spiritual leaders of Mujaheddin units “El Mujaheddin” in Bosnia together with Abd-al Rahman, Sheikh Anwar Shaban and Abu Hamza;

(See photo, picture captured from video taped interwiev with Sheikh Omar Sayf of Yemen. “…Whereever You are, deth will catch You…Christians and Jewish…” “They accuse us we are terrorists! We are terrorists! And we will terrorise all infidels till our feith in Allah is not upper…” he said.)

24. Al-Qaeda’s Specific Intelligence Strategies

Current intelligence services of the specific countries already identified as active sponsors of terrorism often assist their associated states to hide the terrorist activities of the Al-Qaeda network by aiding the state and its officials in hiding their clandestine terrorist operations. Al-Qaeda moreover assists these terrorist sponsoring states in later denying they actively assisted Al-Quada in undertaking acts of exposed terrorism later and under the guise of the modish term today "fighting terrorism," such terrorist sponsoring states are always capable of merely arresting a few Al-Qaeda cell members when the state itself comes under the political aim and fire of as an example, the United States and/or one of itse political NATO allies as England. By making an easy arrest of a few Al-Qaeda members, terrorist sponsoring states attempt to merely pass such an arrest off as their making a larger contribution to fighting terrorism and such an easy arrest usually achieves another component to its overall goal which is to keep the political pressure off the state itself and its terrorist sponsoring activities bascked by Al-Qaeda for as long as possible before making another arrest under the pressure deriving from the western states.

Al-Qaeda has also managed to develop another terrorist methodology of sorts to attempt protecting itself and its activities. This method, premised upon many terrorist activities’ basic strategic pattern is as many times mentioned the opening of a series of humanitarian organizations, charities, financial and educational institutions including those based upon many media enterprises throughout the world. These organizations serve as mere channels for organizational fundraising, religious indoctrination, infiltration of the local Muslim population, training cadres, recruiting additional terrorists as well as the smuggling of both terrorists and weaponry. The character of activities ranges from country to country, depending on the assessment of "danger" to which the states native Muslim population is at risk to.

In countries where there no armed conflict exists between Islamic and other religions, the network’s organizations are primarily used for fundraising where the funds raised will be distributed and used elsewhere that Al-Qaeda’s leadership considers Islam needs it most. Al-Qaeda-controlled media in terrorist sponsoring states have been known to employ a program of psychological and propaganda warfare where the aim is winning over the overall public opinion in the support of Islamic causes either locally or worldwide. Similar programs are conducted by certain other Islamic cadres within educational institutions.

In areas where Al-Qaeda’s leaders deem local Muslim believers as they themselves being in some form of life threatening risk, the aforementioned organizations often act as ideal channels for the network to undertake intelligence infiltrationd into certain targeted states. They also serve as an excellent cover for terrorist activities as well as channels for infiltrating the network’s individual terrorists into target states, channeling both needed weaponry as well as money and other forms of valuable intelligence assets into geopolitical locales.

Educational institutions also serve in other valuable ways enabling Al-Qaeda to both indoctrinate and also educates new religious cadres and also others comprising the overall terrorist network serving its basic needs for existence. They also serve as additional ways of introducing the ideology of militant Islam to new possible young Muslim religious candidates as well as being use as channels for terrorist infiltration /supply.

All these organizations act as covers for the network’s unconventional warfare activities and additionally serve as individual nerve centers for Al-Qaeda’s coordinated activities to be undertaken at some unknown future time om one of the global western: political, economic, psychological and/or militant/ intelligence arenas. Through these covers, these terrorist NGO organizations attain increasingly greater social involvement coupled with being capable of better raising money/fundraising for their so-called ‘humanitarian aid activities’ in addition to undertaking their other many social, educational and economic programs. And this makes such organizations themselves out as both seemingly valuable as well as attractive institutional elements to have in existence in and of themselves for the local Islamic population. It also makes them extremely difficult targets for anti-terrorist organizations to legally shutdown. And when and if they are discovered as terrorist sponsoring organizations and when they are eventually if ever shutdown, it is wise for them to be legitimately replaced by genuine humanitarian organizations because where they are not replaced, there exist great voids and power vacuums in which new terrorist organizations can grow out thereof human economic necessity. In more times then none they eventually act merely as mere voids soon refilled by the same terrorist elements. From this large array of choices Al-Qaida recruits and trains future terrorists. To this single purpose the network exists, while incessantly seeking greater legitimacy where it can/ through its humanitarian activities offering economic assistance to the local population so that it can obtain wider acceptance amidst the local population while manipulating Islam as one of the world’s major religions.

Worldwide, most Muslims are sincere believers. However, they are still capable of becoming mere victims of Al-Qaeda’s global propaganda campaign on which it incessantly serves the cause of militant Islamist ideals which attempt justifying terrorism while simultaneously promoting notions that worldwide, Muslims are endangered by all other people and confessions/faiths. Such types of Islamist propaganda usually tends to fuse with already existing ethnic and social tensions. Islamic terrorists can use and abuse their non-governmental organizations by infiltrating them into these target areas in order to create an operationally existing forceful intelligence-gathering network that will work toward   training local recruits, conducting religious indoctrination and even participating in local conflicts.

Ultimately, by creating such an intelligence terrorist infrastructure, it would eventually act as well as operate as part of the global terrorist network.

The main goal of these cells would then be to ignite a global Jihad against all non-Muslims, globally. Hence,Al-Qaeda cells already created from the local Muslim population would actively engage in Al-Qaeda’s work according to the strategic methodology of Al-Qaeda’s instructors. Exemplary of this Al-Qaeda strategic pattern can be seen within Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania and Kosovo-Metohia. The Bosnian War served as an ideal opportunity for Al-Qaeda to branch out the local toward the global network structure of Islamic terrorism [in the "Bosnian model"].

Following the already described pattern of Al-Qaeda’s usage of humanitarian, educational, religious and other organizations having as a primar purpose the expansion of their universal terrorist network and its associated sponsors have been over forty existing charitable organizations already registered within the geopolitical territory of Bosnia and Croatia alone [of those known today]. Key players in importing this existing terrorism into Bosnia were the: TWRA, Fund for Islamic Rebirth, Global Relief Foundation, Benevolence International Foundation, Al-Khufan, Global Medical Relief Found, IGASA, Nahla, Al-Muwafaq, Bureau of Islamic Calling, Al-Haramain and the Saudi Refugee Committee Humanitarian Relief Agency amongst others still to be reveiled.

In 1993, Algerian Abdel Alis Zaher became head of the regional office of IGASA charity based, in Vienna. This organization also had branches in Skopje (headed by Algerian Abu Mohammed) and Zagreb (headed by Algerian Lamrani Jamel, with a nom-de-guerre Abu Musab. He will resurface in Kosovo as one of the instructors for the mojahedeen unit "Abu Bakr as-Sadiq"). All three had once been students in Belgrade, where in the early 1990s they were arrested as members of the religious terrorist organization Islamic Salvation Front, thus the ISF. The ISF, the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) and the Sudanese wing of the Islamic Brotherhood collected and gathered students from Sudan, Algeria, Egypt and Palestine into a religious terrorist organization known both as "Association of Islamic Students of Palestine" and "IGASA." After their arrest, all their members were from Yugoslavia. IGASA mostly dealt with logistics and import of weapons and ammunition for Islamic terrorists to the area.

The Bureau for Islamic Calling is headquartered in Riyadh and is sponsored by the Saudi government under the present cover of allegeded efforts in spreading the words of genuine Islam through publishing, lecturing in mosques and by contacting individuals by organizing religious gatherings. Its leader was a man whose name is Abdullah Duhayman, today serving a prison sentence in another Algerian prison.

In addition, according to Western intelligence services the same man used to be Osama Bin Laden’s top lieutenant. Al-Khufan [sp] was registered at the end of 1992, in Zagreb. In the charge of this very organization was yet another Algerian whose name is Ad Din Qirban, presently wanted by the FBI in the U.S. on terrorism charges of attempting to bomb the US Embassy in Rome. According to Mr. Kopriva Spend, the Political/Religious Commissar of the Jihad Unit named, "Abu Bekir Sidik" the Bureau for Islamic Calling located in the Balkans could be defined as:

"Is merely a religious organization whose goal is to spread Islam. Besides, every religion has its organizations which are counterparts of the Bureau for Islamic Calling and many religions, when it is necessary, formed military units for the protection of the people and the religion. Through the Bureau, we educated our faithful Islamic people about Islam and its secrets and assisted people in realizing the beauty and beneficial nature of the Islamic faith. We tried to help them grasp their true Islamic identity."

Al-Muwafaq was registered in Zagreb as a branch of another associated organization headquartered in London. It dealt with charity work between 1992 and 1996. In charge of it was a Tunisian woman, Safik Iyadi, known to Interpol for "laundering" Kuwaiti dinars , later detained by Iraq during its 1990 invasion. Her main duties were to provide support to the TWRA and infiltrate terrorists from Croatia into Bosnia. There are also direct indications pointing to certain circles in the U.S. as to her associates participating in this terrorist act.

The Saudi Arabia-based Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation is a private, charitable educational organization dedicated to promotion of Islamic teachings worldwide. However, an increasingly large number of its funding derives itself from grants originating from Islamic terrorist sponsoring countries, from variant individual Muslim benefactors and from certain specific campaigns, which selectively target Muslim owned business entities worldwide selectively asking them to donate funds.

The Saudi Arabia-based Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation is a private, charitable educational organization dedicated to promotion of Islamic teachings worldwide. What is interesting is a fact that large sums of money for funding their activities are derivates of an assortment of grants originating from countries sponsoring Islam terrorism . Thus/likewise the money is donated by individual Muslim benefactors as well as it is collected from specialy designed campaigns which select and address Muslims with their own private businesses requesting them to donate fund for an ultimate cause..

The specific branch offices of Al Haramain located in Somalia and Bosnia, are without a doubt linked to provision of finances to terrorism. The Somalia office of Al-Haramain is linked to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network and also to the Al-Itihaad al-Islamiya (AIAI), a Somali terrorist group. Al-Haramain Somalia employed AIAI members and provided them salaries through the Al-Barakaat Bank, which was designated on November 7, 2001 under [E.O. 13224] because of its activities as a principal source of funding intelligence and monetary transfers in order to supply assistance to Osama bin Laden. The Bosnian office of Al-Haramain is also linked to Al-Gama'at Al-Islamiyya, an Egyptian terrorist group.

Al-Gama'at Al-Islamiyya was designated on November 2nd 2001 and is signatory to Osama bin Laden's Fatwah dated February 23rd 1998, targeting Americans and their allies. Al-Haramain was registered in Zagreb [1992]. Later its headquarters were relocated to Zenica in Bosnia [2 Lukovo Polje Street]. Its activities in Bosnia first and foremost focused on providing the : logistical support, enabling terrorist’s infiltrations from Croatia into Bosnia, supporting infiltratated terrorists providing necessary means for their training and financing. Associated to which support these illegal activities were the specific governments and intelligence services of the following countries:

- Iran, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Turkey (Provided Instructors);

- Iran, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Pakistan, Kuwait (Provided Money);

- Iran, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan (Provided Al-Qaeda with Manpower);

-Organization of Islamic Conference (Provided Political Support from the localation at the United Nations and also from out of many other International Institutions);

- The governments of Slovenia and Croatia equally gave a green-light for Al-Qaeda’s terrorists transport and for the transport of their equipment across their state territories for a mere monetary percentage approximately between 15-30% of the total value transported interstate.

The main Islamist agency located in Europe is in Vienna, and is providing Islamists located in and around Bosnia with logistic and ideological support derived itself from Islamic fundamentalist circles before, during and after the Civil War named, TWRA.

"Bosnia must become a Muslim state eventually, for if that did not happen, then the whole war would be senseless and would have been fought for nothing"

This statementwas completed in 1994 by, Elfatih Ali Hasanein,the former Head of the Islamic Organization bearing the name of Third World Relief Agency (TWRA). This Muslim charity, founded in Vienna [1987] possessed/declared the official goal of encouraging an entire rebirth of Islam throughout Eastern Europe and then throughout the entire former Soviet Union and CIS. According to the CIA, one of TWRA’s activities was fundraising for the Muslim Brotherhood in Sudan. The agency was founded by a El-fatih Hassanein, a member of the ruling Saudi National Islamic Front and his brother Sukarno Hassanein. Currently the U.S. and other Western countries have classified the National Islamic Front as a radical Islamist fundamentalist political organization previously founded by Hasan Abdullah Turabi, Secretary-General of the Muslim Brotherhood [Another extreme Islamist Organization]. This organization played a key role in establishment of a network of other Islamic terrorist and/or extremist organizations.

Mr. Turabi was a professor at Khartoum Law School, dedicating his entire career to inquiring into new methods of introducing the Sharia Islamic Law into Sudan and other Islamic countries. He was also well known for his hot-tempered rhetoric speaches against secular ideologies. Today Turabi is known to the world today for his widely public refuge offerings to terrorists. Osama Bin Laden after he was exiled from Saudi Arabia. Sudan itself was declared by the United States a terrorist sponsoring state.

According to the Bosnian Muslim weekly magazine, Dani, El-fatih Hassanein, member of the Muslim Brotherhood, was once a student of University of Belgrade (he studied medicine) and was a friend with Islamic President of Muslim Republic within Bosnia, Alija Izetbegovic since 1970. Izetbegovic himself was an Islamist scholar then, often visiting many such close Islamic/Muslim intellectuals back then, when he used to travel to and from Serbia,Belgrade. In fact, during his 1983 trial held in Sarajevo, Izetbegovic confirmed he was a good friend with Mr. El-fatih Hassanein.

Besides, an official cooperation existed once between the TWRA and former Islamic Bosnian President Izetbegovic and his associated government. This collaboration begun in late 1992. At this time, TWRA had just opened branche offices in: Sarajevo, Budapest, Moscow and Istanbul [All key centers for its later weapons-smuggling activities].

The Bosnian Muslim political wing and the man responsible for bringing mujahadeens to Bosnia and Herzegovina; Alija Izetbegovic, SDA and Bosnian Muslim president guaranteed El-fatih Hassanein’s credentials to the Die Erste Osterreich Bank (Austria), hence enabling him to open an account there. The Bosnian Muslims used the bank account to solicit and transit funds designed for arms purchases.

Just about earlier in March 1992, El-fatih Hassanein was issued a diplomatic passport and became the new [Cultural Attaché appointed to the Saudi Embassy in Vienna]. This position made possible for him to begin transfer of large sums of money through Croatia and Slovenia [he was also able to avoid any legal scrutiny by police via his diplomatic imunity]. Consequently, in October 1992 the former [Foreign Minister of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Haris Silajdzic] visited the, Die Erste Osterreich Bank in Vienna, later confirming the aforementioned activity. Hassanein had at that time, all necessary diplomatic credentials to financially represent the besieged Bosnia and Herzegovina and then, in 1993, Alija Izetbegovic wrote to that same Austrian bank yet again confirming that this Sudanese citizen had attained the entire trust of the Islamist component of Bosnian government at a time.

The diplomatic operations supporting terrorist begun innocently, undertaking them only then through using civilian projects serving as mere cover such as both the opening a poultry farm, a news agency and/or a simple textile factory – in one word he used the production of anything through which he later could facilitate waging civil war in Bosnia later. Moreover, both the creation of the Bosnian Muslim news agency TWRA was another important step he used for dissimilating Islamic disinformation and Islamic fundamentalist extremist ideology.

At the same time money was also flowing from the states of Iran, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Brunei and Malaysia. One of the donors was Osama bin Laden himself. Die Erste Osterreich Bank representatives later claimed that between 1992 and 1995, some $350 million dollars passed through the hands of the TWRA: $80 million in 1992, $231 in 1993, $39 million in 1994-95 and the whopping sum of $500,000 by August 1996. Most of this money, according to bank officials was spent on weaponry purchases during the Islamic ccomcponent of the Bosnian Civil War [1990s]. Additionally, it was also primarily used to bribe many Croatian and Slovenian official and civilian authorities as well as many Bosnian Croat citizenry to "look the other way" so to speak when dealing with those smuggling weaponry into the "Islamic Portion of the Bosnian Army."

The first remarkably large operation carried out successfully by the TWRA was in September 1992 when a hired Russian cargo plane flying from the Sudanese capital, Khartoum flew into the Maribor airport carrying what was at a time referred to as "humanitarian aid."

Nevertheless, it was later discovered that the actual contents of this plane was over 120 tons of guns, mortars, mines and ammunition. These weapons were Soviet made and came from an old Soviet military base. Soon after the discovery of weapons purchase through a Bosnian-Turkish connection [Which German law enforcement agents later identified as being affiliated with at least thirty persons]; all ethnic Bosnian Muslim and Turkish nationals, all participating in this weapons purchase. The weapons were placed inside warehous in the former portion of East Germany. Hired Russian helicopters transported part of this weapons shipment to Tuzla and Zenica while the carrying plane refueled in Split. It is also believed these helicopter carriers were procured by representatives of the joint Russo-American company named, Eco-Trends.

The remaining 10,000 rifles, 750,000 rounds, rockets and other explosives remained for a year at another warehouse located in Maribor. The value of these weapons is estimated to be at least $10 million dollars. When the weapons were discovered, it became crustally clear that the TWRA paid for their warehousing. Since then, the agency has been targeted by anti-terrorist intelligence observations originating from Western states intelligence agencies. However, these western anti-terrorist states took no prior steps to halt any of the aforementioned transport of weapons; the question which remains is: Why?

TWRA also played a key role in the import of Iranian weapons, which began in May 1994 through Croatia, with the CIA’s consent.

Then during September 1995, counter-terrorist units from the Austrian police raided the TWRA offices located in Vienna, seizing several vanloads of documents. Those documents contained the above-cited facts, and stated that TWRA had other numerous connections with additional radical Islamic organizations and individuals with whom many radical Islamists residing within Bosnia are still connected . According to the apprehended documents, some members of this network inlcude: on account of

Sheik Omar Abd-el-Rahman [radical Imam from Egypt convicted of organizing the 1993 terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in New York. U.S. judicial authorities found information linking him with the TWRA. In addition, Austrian counter-terrorist police now possess audio tapes of conversations taking place one time between Sheik Rahman and TWRA officials in Vienna.

The dominant topic of these conversations was how to sell video tapes of the Sheik’s messages and sermons in European mosques. U.S. intelligence agents and operatives today directly link Sheik Omar Abd-el-Rahman (spiritual leader of “El Muhajedin” unit in Bosnia), Dr. Ayman al-Zawahari and Osama Bin Laden. Then in mid-January 1996, Islamist leaders broadcasted many of his Islamist sermons, all of those composed on the eve of his conviction for terrorism in relation to the World Trade Center in New York City. The sermon emphasized the crucial role of extremist Islamists residing within Bosnia and their part of the global struggle "for the cause of Islam."

Osama bin Laden was one of many other TWRA donors, and all worked together through Hassan Al-Turaby whom had strong ties with Hassanein. Since 1998, he was Head of the part of Al-Qaeda located within the state of Afghanistan. He was later suspected of organizing the terrorist attacks against both New York and Washington on September 11th 2001 in its aftermath during which both the U.S. and its political ally the U.K. invaded Afghanistan for the explicit purpose of destroying the "nest" of Al-Qaeda along with Osama bin Laden himself;

25. Key Bosnian Islamist Al-Qaeda Players

1) Irfan Ljevakovic [A founder of SDA party also involved in importi of Islamic terrorists into Bosnia and Herzegovina under auspices of the humanitarian work of the TWRA];

2) Alija Izetbegovic [Connected to above-mentioned El-fatih Hassanein for many years. He composed a letter to Die Erste Osterreich Bank in 1993 guaranteeing his honesty. Then, during the Bosnian civil war he allowed a large influx of Mujahedeen Islamist fighters to join the Bosnian Muslim Army. After the civil war, many of these men were illegally granted Bosnian citizenship and were allowed to settle in Bosnia; most reside today in the village, Bocinja];

3) Hasan Cengic [A theologian connected to terrorism in Iran since 1983. His father is Halid Cengic a veteran of the 13th Waffen SS division of World War Two. Hasan Cengic moreover organized the influx of Mojahedeen fighters into Bosnia and managed the Visoko supply base. He was later identified as the person through whom the TWRA sent weapons into Bosnia, starting in 1992, as well as a member of the TWRA’s governing board];

4) Dzemal Merdan[Dedicated his life to the teachings of the Iranian Ayatollah Khomeini; he was also a key liaison to many foreign mojahedeen];

5) Husein Zivalj[A former Bosnian Ambassador appointed to the U.N., who after serving as Deputy Foreign Minister and former Bosnian Ambassador to Austria, was given a position on the TWRA governing board. He was present in New York during the terrorist attack on September 11th 2001 and then, two months later, resigned from his diplomatic posts at the New York United Nations Mission of Bosnia. It is important to emphasise that his resignation came only after several months of service on diplomatic duty];

6) Faris Nanic[Once a prominent member of the SDA political party in Zagreb and one time advisor to former Islamic President of Islamic component of Bosnia, Alija Izetbegovic];

7) Salim Sabic [Once prominent member of the SDA and once Head of the Vienna branch of International Associations for Aid to Muslims of Bosnia and Herzegovina once based inZagreb];

 8) Dervis Djurdjevic [Once a prominent member of the SDA, he was convicted of terrorist activities in 1983 and later sentenced to five years imprisonment; also he was an associate of El-fatih Hassanein and also was a one time member of the TWRA governing board];

Despite much evidence gathered by the Austrian counter-terrorist police who was more than sufficient to detain its employees and to bar its further operations, TWRA continued to operate until 1996. Between 1995 and 1996, some $350,000 was transferr through it. El-fatih Hassanein left Austria for Istanbul in 1994 after he was notify that an investigation into his former gunrunning and money laundering operations was open. He remained in close contact with Alija Izetbegovic thereafter decorating him in August 1996 for his so-called humanitarian efforts undertaken by him within Bosnia. Both men met privately in Istanbul and then in Sarajevo at which time Hassanein took visi upon Izetbegovic’s invitation.

According to intelligence information, Hassanein also visited Macedonia being actively engag with aiding the efforts of Albanian terrorists active in Kosovo. IT has also been discover that later he traveled through Macedonia traveling inide a NATO vehicle with French markings while carrying a false passport. Hassanein was one of the key organizers of the Albanian terrorist organization named [UCK] whose training camps were located in: Bajram Curri, Tropoja and Kukes.

The Macedonian security service classified him as Al-Qaeda’s leader for the entirety of southeastern Europe. According to the same source, Saudi citizen Umar Alvadi [sp] is his point man insofar as Macedonia.

Furthermore, the identical intelligence source also confirmed the most important player in this entire gun-running chain was an Austrian arms dealer named Dieter Hoffman not long prior employed by, El-fatih Hassanein. Insofar as international arms dealers’ arenas, Hoffman has a wide reputation for being a specialist able to easily procure both airplanes and helicopters capable of transporting weapons to destinations determined by his customers. Several times Hoffman was even contacted by many high ranking KGB [now FSB Officials] for purchases of airplanes and helicopters. He was particularly interested in engaging transportation of helicopters and anti-aircraft systems known as, "pins". Within only two years he had his own contracting company known as the, "Flying Tigers," who transported several hundred tons of war materials into Bosnia. One of their renown Routes for their airlifts was: Khartoum (for loading), Maribor (for landing and unloading), and then to Jablanica via Split and the Neretva valley either by helicopter or truck.

The Iranian intelligence also played a key role in the military training of both the Al-Qaeda’s global terrorists as well as training for the Islamic component of the "Bosnian Army." Iran has recently also been classified by the U.S. government as a state sponsoring terrorism [Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, and also both the Refah party in Turkey and radical fundamentalists in both Algeria and Egypt]. The Clinton Administration remained unwavering on the path it had chosen in claiming to be committed to finding a peaceful solution to the Civil Wars that once raged within Bosnia and Herzegovina. However, in reality the Clinton Administration was genuinely unwavering in its being totally committed in forcing only a Muslim victory insofar as the entire Bosnia and Herzegovinan civil wars.

The very essence of this victory lied in the Clinton’s strategy of only empowering the Islamic Sarajevo leadership which, at the very best enjoyed only about twenty percent support and recognition in a country [Bosnia and Herzegovina] where more than two-third of the population is Christian and adamantly opposed to living under any resemblance of an Islamic run state. With full knowledge of these facts regarding Iranian rule and its role as well in the "Islamization and radicalization" of Bosnia’s Muslim fundamentalist, Bill Clinton’s full administration always managed to look the other way while showing their baised support for the Islamists only during the war itself.

Then just between 1992 and the end of 1995, aid flowed into to help "fellow Muslim brothers" in Bosnia which originated from Iran which sent the 7th Revolutionary Guards (Pasdaran Brigade) some 2000 men, incorporating into the Bosnian Muslim Army.

Based in Zenica, the Iranian brigade trained local cadres, as well as participated in fierce fighting on all fronts. In addition to this force, Iran also sent some 400 officers of the Pasdaran intelligence and the VEVAK secret service work with the nascent Bosnian Muslim intelligence and other terrorist groups. Some spies worked through the Iranian charities, mostly registered in Zagreb. Mohammed Dzevad Azayes, a high-ranking diplomat at the Iranian Embassy in Zagreb, was in charge of coordinating the intelligence and terrorist operations under the guise of "charity" work.

Britain Targets Muslim Women To Fight Extremists

Source: Reuters, By Ana Nicolaci da Costa and Siddhartha Dubey, 26 Mar 08

In a school in south London , women in headscarves are learning English, childcare skills and citizenship, to smooth their integration into British life.

The courses are encouraged under a new government policy to "empower" Muslim women, ultimately to combat the threat from Islamist violence, a threat made brutally clear when four homegrown suicide bombers killed 52 people in London in 2005.

Triggered by events from racial violence in northern England in 2001 to the London bombings, British policy on ethnic minorities has shifted from a "laissez-faire" approach to encouraging integration or "community cohesion," said Rick Muir, research fellow at the Institute for Public Policy Research.  But Shazia Qayum's story illustrates the obstacles still to be overcome in a country with more than 1.6 million Muslims.

Qayum, who lives in the northern city of Derby , says her family kept her away from school for a year at age 15, planning a forced marriage to a Pakistani cousin.  She ran away from her family after her marriage: now aged 28, she works with women who are undergoing similar experiences: "In the eyes of my parents, I am dead," she said.

"The surprising thing ... is that no one asked the question where I was. No one from education welfare.  No one from social services and no one from the police."

This sort of alienation and isolation is one problem that the "empowerment" scheme could address.  The policy's backers say the main goal is for Britain 's estimated 800,000 Muslim women to become more influential in their communities, which might stem the threat from disaffected young Muslim men.

"Muslim women have a unique role to play in tackling the spread of violent extremism," Communities Secretary Hazel Blears said as she unveiled the plan, backed by Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

"I want to see more done in communities to build the capacity of Muslim women to shape their communities and to engage with disaffected groups."

It's a message that resonates with the women at the Bellenden Old School in south London , but the policy has been denounced as patronizing and clumsy by some Muslim leaders.

"I know I can offer something to this country," said Ines Meddah, a 26-year-old Algerian lawyer at the London school. "But sometimes I feel like I am in a prison because I struggle to share my know-how."

Alienation

From a new citizenship test for people seeking to live in Britain to a recent suggestion that young people swear an oath of allegiance to the Queen, the pressure to integrate is mounting -- but it faces complex and deep-rooted obstacles.

In a document published in January, Blears highlighted figures showing almost two-thirds of Muslim women in Britain are "economically inactive" -- as opposed to about a quarter of all women.  Her plan would see tens of millions of pounds spent through local communities to raise their involvement.

"We want the government to help those who are educated who want to (achieve) something in this country," said Meddah, who has lived in London for two years.   But despite visible backing for the scheme from Brown, some Muslim community leaders are alienated by the way it has been presented.

"Why is it that anything that has to do with Muslims, has to do with terrorism?" said Reefat Drabu, Chair of the Social and Family Affairs Committee of the Muslim Council of Britain.  While in favor of female empowerment, she said linking it with reducing the threat of terrorism was ludicrous.

"If they want to combat terrorism, they really need to get out of their denial and realize that they need to look at the policies, as far as foreign policies, policies at home, domestic policies to win the hearts and minds of people," she said.

At the heart of the issue is the rise in tension between Muslims and other Britons since the September 11, 2001 attacks on New York and Washington , the 2005 London attacks and thwarted car bomb attacks in London and Glasgow last year.   The Muslim Public Affairs Committee, which calls itself Britain 's largest Muslim civil liberties group, said Blears' initiative was missing the larger point -- discrimination.

"What Blears seems to fail to recognize is that women are unequivocally recognized by Islam as the moral authority in their homes," the organization commented on its Web site. "They do not need condescending advice on how they can better fulfill their roles in this sphere."

Another Muslim scholar said the scheme was ill-conceived.

"What does the government mean to say when they want to empower Muslim women? Against whom or what? Their men and their 'traditions', of course," said Professor Werner Menski, chair of the Centre for Ethnic Minority Studies at SOAS.

"All this talk about wanting to listen will throw some money at a problem that is far bigger than just women's empowerment."

Traditions

The women at the London school -- from countries as culturally diverse as Somalia , Iran , Algeria and Syria -- urged against generalizing Muslim experiences in Britain and in so doing propagating common prejudices.

"One must not put everyone in the same basket," Meddah said. "Here there are pharmacists, teachers, engineers, we are not extremists. We just want to have a good life, that's all. We want to live well in this country."

In pockets of some Asian communities in Britain , the notion of "empowering" women is directly opposed to imported rural traditions restricting their roles. In extreme cases, women's lives may be at risk if they try to break the mould.

A British government-funded study by consultant Nazia Khanum in early March found that in one town alone -- Luton , where the largest ethnic minority is Pakistani -- there were more than 300 approaches a year to external bodies for advice of some sort on forced marriage.

In Luton, as in other towns and cities in northern England , the Asian community is largely segregated from the white, and concerns are mounting over the number of girls whose parents are removing them from education in order to marry them off.

Britain 's Forced Marriage Unit receives more than 5,000 inquiries a year and last year intervened in 400 cases, many of them people forced into marriage with someone from overseas.

"Since it is mostly men who are perpetrators of forced marriages and domestic violence, the education of men is essential as a preventative measure," Khanum's report said.

Militants Kidnap 9 Teenagers For Possible Suicide Attack Training

Source: Daily Times, in English (OSC), 24 Mar 08

Nine Swat teenagers are feared to have been kidnapped by suspected militants "to be trained as suicide bombers".

            Of the nine, four teenagers from the Taran, Gharo, and Aligram areas have gone missing from the hostel of the Excellence Academy of Education, Kabal. The Kabal police have registered an FIR. Three of the missing boys were from Aligram and one each were from Taran and Kalu Dagai. Sher Hassan, the father of Obaidullah, a missing boy, told Daily Times that his son had been missing since March 13 when he left for Hadassah Jama Darul Uloom Sharifabad, Swat. "He is not attending his cell-phone," Sher Hassan added. Police officials say they fear that militants have kidnapped the boys to use them for subversive activities. Meanwhile, Anjumaan Nijaat, a Lahore resident, has brought three youths who went missing in the metropolis back to Swat.

Related news:

Police Reportedly Warns Entry Of 10 Suicide Bombers Into Major Cities

Source: Daily Express, in Urdu, 24 Mar 08 – Translated by OSC

The interior ministry has intimated the Islamabad, Lahore , and Multan police that eight to 10 juvenile suicide bombers have entered into these cities.

            According to a private television channel, a letter written by the National Crisis Management Cell to police authorities says that these bombers had left Waziristan for these cities on 12 March after which the security there was put on high alert. The interior ministry has informed the Islamabad police that US , British, and Dutch diplomats can be targeted. They may also attack the security agencies, the ministry said. In addition, stock exchanges, cinema houses, and a seminary in Lahore are also on their list of targets. According to reports, the terrorists can use explosive-laden vehicles and motorcycles for such attacks. While talking to the private television channel, Syed Kalim Imam, Senior Superindent of Police, Islamabad , confirmed that they had received a tip-off about the entry of the terrorists. The terrorists, however, were unable to target the Pakistan Day Parade and Easter ceremonies as security was put on high alert. He said that the police had arrested more than 75 suspected persons in Islamabad .  

How To Raise A Suicide Bomber

More proof that Al Qaeda in Iraq is getting desparate… It is sad that all they are doing is training their own children how to die. Unfortunately, the liberals in America will cry that this is all our fault and that we are breeding terrorism. Sorry guys, but this is the reality of the enemy. They choose to raise their children to become weapons of warfare. This is nothing more than a form of 4g warfare.

Then on top of exploiting these children and trying to turn them into terrorists, Al Qaeda has the nerve to use them for ransom to fund their own terror initiatives…

WASHINGTON —  Al Qaeda propaganda tapes released by Multinational Forces-Iraq reveal a possible new trend in the group’s terror strategy in Iraq.

The tapes, obtained by FOX News and later released to the media, are training videos showing black-masked Iraqi children between 6 and 14 being taught how to hold AK-47s, stop a car and carry out a kidnapping, break into a house and break into a courtyard and terrorize the individuals living there.

Footage aired for reporters showed an apparent training operation in which the boys are seen storming a house and holding guns to the heads of mock residents. Another tape showed a young boy wearing a suicide vest and posing with automatic weapons.

They also are shown being taught to use rocket-propelled grenade launchers.

“These were young boys all masked and hooded, all outfitted with weapons; adults were doing the training,” said Rear Adm. Greg Smith, a spokesman for Multinational Forces-Iraq.

“Al Qaeda is clearly using children to exploit other children to get the interest of Jihad spread among teenagers far and wide. They use this footage on the Internet to encourage other young boys to join the jihad movement.”

And at a U.S. military briefing on Wednesday in Baghdad’s heavily guarded Green Zone, he added: “Al Qaeda in Iraq wants to poison the next generation of Iraqis. It is offering children as the new generation of mujahedeen,” he said, using the Arabic term for holy warriors.

The five videotapes found included raw footage that the U.S. military believes was to be used in future propaganda tapes. They obtained the material in a Dec. 4 raid in Khan Bani Sad — about halfway between Baghdad and Baquba.

Other scenes from the Khan Bani Saad video showed masked boys forcing a man off his bicycle at gunpoint and stopping a car and kidnapping its driver along a dusty country road. At one point the boys — wearing soccer jerseys with ammunition slung across their chests — sit in a circle on the floor, chanting slogans in support of Al Qaeda.

• Click here to view video.

Coalition forces also obtained another tape, shot by Iraqi-led forces, that shows a mission in which a kidnapped 11-year-old Iraqi boy is rescued after being held for ransom.

Acting on a tip from a local Iraqi, the forces planned a surprise raid last week on a home in Kirkuk where an 11-year-old boy, the son of a Kurdish mechanic, was being held for a $100,000 ransom by Al Qaeda.

The kidnappers had held the boy, Ammar, for four days.

Kidnapping and extortion are how Al Qaeda in Iraq finances its attacks. It is big business. But this time there was a happy ending.

“As he came out from under that curtain you could tell he looked terrified,” Smith told FOX News in an interview, speaking about the boy. “He gave his name and they said, ‘You’re the one we are looking for,’ and you could tell he was much relieved at that point.”

The raid began before dawn.

“They approached on foot,” Smith said from Baghdad. “They knew precisely what door they needed to go to. They came down a small alleyway. The door was locked, they yelled inside for it to be unlocked, it was not unlocked so they broke the door down.”

The security forces entered a small room.

“The Al Qaeda member who had custody of this young boy was also in shock by the entrance and the quick operations by the Iraq security forces,” Smith said.

One of the kidnappers was caught inside the room where the boy was hiding. All of the shooting and shouting left the boy terrified, according to those who participated in the raid.

“They got him into the car,” Smith recalled. “They handed him a cell phone so he could call his mother, and he was very composed. He just said, ‘Hello. This is Ammar.’

“He said, ‘I am here. I am safe.’”

An officer on the other end of the line could hear the family screaming and shouting. Soon after, the boy was delivered back to cheering neighbors and family members.

This story had a happy ending, but most kidnappings in Iraq do not. Ammar was from a simple family, and his father never could have paid the $100,000 ransom.

In an interview after his son was returned to the family, Ammar’s father said, “The kidnappers told us that if we fail to pay the ransom, they will behead my son and put his head in the garbage can in front of my house. We told them that we don’t have money.”

The raid netted five kidnappers and led the coalition forces to another boy being held in a hideout nearby. He was freed on Sunday.

Al Qaeda’s networks are not difficult to unravel once a successful raid has been completed. Its operatives’ obsessive need to keep accurate books, such as an accountant might, has provided coalition troops with a treasure trove of intelligence.

Much like the Nazis in World War II, Al Qaeda operatives document their every action, be it a bombing or kidnapping. It is the way they get paid by the organization.

The kidnapping ring that was broken last week had recorded 26 other kidnappings. Coalition forces did not know how many had ended in release, and how many in death.

Iraqi Defense Ministry spokesman Mohammed al-Askari told reporters that militants are kidnapping more and more Iraqi children, though he could not offer details or numbers.

“This is not only to recruit them, but also to demand ransom to fund the operations of Al Qaeda,” al-Askari said.

The group included about 20 children being “trained.” At the end of the hourlong video they are sent into their parents’ arms, suggesting the training has parental approval and that the children likely come from Al Qaeda-affiliated households.

The tapes’ discovery adds to Al Qaeda’s exploitation of children as well as women; just last weekend two female homicide bombers wrapped in explosives targeted a Baghdad market, killing nearly 100 people.

Smith said pictures of the bombers’ remains show their faces to have distinctive Down Syndrome features, making them unlikely suspects.

After the attack, Iraqis in Baghdad demanded more protection for markets, saying one of the bombers was not searched because she was known as a local beggar and the male guards were reluctant to search women because of Islamic sensitivities, as women are not searched in public places.

The police are recruiting female officers, yet there does not appear to be a plan to train them to search members of their own sex.

As for the children in the tapes, “We don’t think they were being trained precisely to go out and conduct operations any time soon,” Smith said. “But clearly there is a pattern of training and a pattern of indoctrination that is being used by Al Qaeda.

“Very young individuals who are very obviously innocent and impressionable, these videos convince them early on that the jihadist movement, the Al Qaeda movement, is something they should belong to and look up to.”

All of this suggests that Al Qaeda in Iraq is planning to continue its recruiting operations for years to come, Smith said.

“In this instance we believe it was for a greater purpose than trying to produce footage for film,” Smith said.

“That footage can be used again on the Internet to convince other young boys around the world to join the movement.”

The U.S. military on Wednesday said coalition forces had killed seven suspected insurgents and detained 45 others during five days of raids across Iraq.

Also Wednesday, a roadside bomb exploded near a police convoy transporting suspected Shiite militia fighters south of Baghdad, killing four passers-by and wounding nine other people, police said. At least 19 people were killed or found dead Wednesday across the country.

The roadside bombing was an apparent attempt to free the 10 detainees who were linked to the Mahdi Army militia that is nominally loyal to radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, according to police Brig. Gen. Ghassan Mohammed Ali.

He said the detainees had been captured over the past month and had been accused of attacking civilians and U.S. and Iraqi security forces in the city.

The bomb went off in Diwaniyah, 80 miles south of Baghdad, where there have been fierce clashes between rival Shiite militia factions engaged in a violent power struggle in the oil-rich area.

Two women and two men in a car near the explosion were killed, and nine other people — two policemen, three prisoners and four civilians — were wounded, Ali said.

Al-Sadr has ordered his militia to stand in a six-month cease-fire that expires at the end of February, but the U.S. military says disaffected fighters have broken with the movement and persisted with attacks.

Iraqi security forces in the area also often are accused of being infiltrated by militia fighters, particularly from the Badr Brigade, the militant arm of the largest Shiite party, the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, or SIIC.

Jennifer Griffin is FOX News’ National Security Correspondent.

FOX News’ Courtney Kealy and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Algeria has ordered the closure of 13 Protestant churches, the head of the denomination said on Monday.

            The move comes amid anger over allegations that Evangelist Christians are trying to convert Muslims. The churches have been told to close their doors until they are issued the permit which non-Muslim groups in theory must have if they want to pursue organised worship, Pastor Mustapha Krim said. "Thirteen chapels, including 11 in Tizi Ouzou, one in Bejaia and one in Bouira have been closed on the orders of local officials," said Krim, who is the leader of the Protestant Church in Algeria. "No reason has been given for this decision," he said, adding that he had made a formal request for explanation from the Algerian state's representative in the Tizi Ouzou region. Algeria passed a law in February 2006 requiring non-Muslim congregations to seek a permit from their regional prefecture, but thus far the order has not been enforced and no Christian churches have been closed. Now, however, a dispute has erupted when Islamic leaders accused Protestant Evangelists of attempting to convert members of Algeria 's Muslim majority to Christianity. Krim's predecessor as leader of Algeria 's Protestants, the 74-year-old American pastor Hugh Johnson, is locked in a legal struggle to stay in the country after the state refused to renew his residence permit. The Protestant Church claims to have 50 000 followers, 10 000 of them active churchgoers, spread across 33 congregations. The ministry for religious affairs, however, says there are only 11 000 Christians in Algeria all told - most of them Catholic - among an overwhelmingly Muslim population of 33 million.

Source: ADN Kronos (Italy), 21 Mar 08

The recent kidnapping of Austrian tourists from Tunisia has exposed the "vulnerability" of north Africa to Islamic extremism, according to a prominent journalist and author.  John Phillips, co-author of a new book entitled Algeria :Anger of the Dispossessed, said the kidnapping of Andrea Kloiber and Wolfgang Ebner was a dangerous precedent.

"The recent kidnapping of two Austrian tourists from Tunisian territory has underlined the potential vulnerability of much of north Africa to extreme Islamism, not just Algeria ," Phillips told Adnkronos International (AKI) in Rome .  The Al-Qaeda Organisation in the Islamic Maghreb on Tuesday extended the deadline to 6 April for negotiations on the release of the tourists who were kidnapped in Tunisia in late February.  The terror formation evolved last year from the Salafite Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC), initially formed to create an Islamic state in Algeria , but now believed to have more widespread aims.  Phillips, who was Algeria special correspondent for The Times of London from 1991 to 1997, said Algerian Islamists had provided a "steady stream" of recruits to fight with the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Iraq .  But he also stressed that Algiers had "played up" the threat from al-Qaeda and its support was difficult to assess.

            "The regime has played up to the hilt the threat from al-Qaeda in Algeria but the real extent of its support is hard to guage," Phillips told AKI.   "Clearly the use of suicide bombers who attacked the office of the prime minister last year and the UN building in Algiers marked a change of tactics by the GSPC, which changed its name to the Al-Qaeda Organisation in the Islamic Maghreb."  Since he worked in Algeria , Phillips has consistently called for an international inquiry into the massacres that occurred in Algeria during the 1990s.  "It is extraordinary that at least 200,000 people are estimated to have died in the Algerian conflict of the 1990s, as many or perhaps more than in the Bosnian civil war, yet there has been no attempt to punish those responsibile," he told AKI.

"Even before the massacres began on a massive scale, questions were raised about the killings of journalists and intellectuals blamed on Islamists."

            In their book, Phillips and co-author Martin Evans, a British historian at the University of Portsmouth , trace the history of Algeria from French colonial rule to its emergence as a non-aligned country.  Phillips said unfortunately the international community appeared to have no desire to put pressure on the military-backed regime to introduce democracy or human rights.  He said the regime had been able to strengthen its power after September 11 by obtaining US support as an ally in the so-called war on terrorism.  "The future for Algeria looks set to be marked by increasing alienation of ordinary 'dispossessed' Algerians angry at the privileged lifestyle of the corrupt ruling elite linked to the army," Phillips said.  "The tensions generated by the desperately unequal distribution of oil and gas wealth and the related mistreatment of the indomitable Berber population are likely to lead to more public disorder."

            Phillips said increased international support for President Bouteflika since the September 11 attacks had reinforced the isolation of ordinary Algerians and 'cynical' western governments did not want to jeopardise their economic stake in the country.  The Austrian tourists, 43-year-old Kloiber and 51-year-old Ebner, have been missing since 22 February.  Al-Qaeda Organisation in the Islamic Maghreb on Tuesday repeated its demand for the release of militants jailed in Tunisia and Algeria in exchange for the two tourists.   Austrian media have reported that the militants demanded a ransom of five million euros for the couple.

McCain Supports Radical Muslims in Kosovo

AIM Column  |  By Cliff Kincaid  |  March 27, 2008

It may be asking too much, however, for the media to cover a gaffe like this. The Kosovo policy is a bipartisan blunder. For the liberal media, Iraq, where McCain differs with Hillary and Obama about the length of stay of the U.S. military, seems to be the only foreign policy issue worth talking about. But the U.S. faces other major problems.

We need to recall that the war against the former Yugoslavia was depicted by the liberal media as a worthwhile humanitarian intervention. But it was waged on the basis of Clinton Administration lies of a "genocide" being waged against Albanian Muslims in Kosovo, a province of Serbia. In fact, the Clinton Administration's NATO war against Yugoslavia probably cost more lives than were lost in the civil war in Kosovo. Serbian troops were forced to withdraw in exchange for an international guarantee that Serbia would retain sovereignty over Kosovo but the province would get substantial autonomy. The U.S. agreed to that, but that agreement was violated when the Bush Administration, with backing from McCain and Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, recently recognized Kosovo's declaration of independence from Serbia.

Sending his wife to Kosovo confirms that McCain accepts Clinton's fraudulent version of what happened there and that he agrees with Bush's "solution," which can only make the situation worse.

Conservatives should contemplate what is happening here. McCain, who says he wants to wage a vigorous war against Islamic radicals worldwide, is prepared to let Muslim extremists come to power in Kosovo and even have their own sovereign state. This is itself a major gaffe. But McCain compounded it when he gave a speech urging the building of "international structures for a durable peace," including strengthening NATO. This sounds good, except that McCain has to know that recognizing Kosovo's independence has split Western nations and even NATO itself. It is a major foreign policy blunder that the next administration, Democrat or Republican, may never recover from. It represents a direct threat to the international order of nation-states. That is why many nations have not recognized this new state of Kosovo. They realize that Kosovo's independence could spark other groups to wage wars against established regimes around the world.

This is not to say that some territories under the control of internationally recognized regimes do not deserve their independence. Tibet, under Chinese Communist occupation, deserves its freedom and sovereignty. And Taiwan should become an independent state as well. China's communist rulers, who opposed Kosovo's independence because they fear it could serve as a precedent for Tibet and Taiwan, are the illegitimate ones. The regime in Beijing should be undermined. But China, which supplies so many of our products and invests so much in our economy, is too big an adversary to pick a fight with. This shows the fallacy of claims of the U.S. being a "superpower." We are at the mercy of China, and the presidential candidates of both major political parties know it. Only a commentator like Lou Dobbs of CNN dares to address the controversy on a regular basis. 

Atrocities occurred on all sides as the former Yugoslavia went through disintegration. But Serbia was involved in trying to hold the former Yugoslavia together when outside powers, including various Arab and Muslim states, were trying to carve the nation up. Kosovo's Muslims, who are a majority, may not be as radical as those in other Arab states. But wait until the radical Mosques that are being established around the territory, with the financial assistance of Saudi Arabia, begin to exert their influence on the next generation. They won't be waving American flags out of gratitude for NATO waging war on Serbia. Meanwhile, many Christian churches In Kosovo have been destroyed, and many Serbs, who are Christians, have fled the province. No wonder Serbian demonstrators recently burned the U.S. embassy there. And yet McCain says he wants to repair America's bad image in the rest of the world. Start with reversing the disastrous Kosovo policy, Senator McCain.

Conservatives should be concerned about the Kosovo policy for another reason. In his Wednesday speech to the World Affairs Council, McCain talked about the security of the state of Israel. He doesn't seem to realize that recognition of Kosovo is a precedent for the creation of another Muslim state, Palestine, in the heart of the Middle East, which could end up being just as much of a threat to the Jewish state as a nuclear Iran. Israeli analysts have recognized this threat. They know that Kosovo is to Serbia what Jerusalem is to Israel. Bush, of course, is the first U.S. president to campaign for the creation of an Arab/Muslim Palestinian state. He encouraged the elections that brought the terrorist group Hamas to power in the Palestinian territories. Does McCain favor this suicidal approach for the state of Israel? Or does Israel's security lie in asserting its own sovereignty and building a border fence? McCain, of course, seems to have an aversion to border fences, at least when they are on the U.S. southern border.

Hillary Clinton was accused of lying about her visit to Bosnia when she was First Lady. The more important controversy is why the U.S. was militarily involved in Bosnia in the first place.  The record shows that her husband approved the shipment of Iranian arms to the Bosnia Muslims so they could fight the Christian Serbs. Clinton then expanded that policy to helping the Muslims in Kosovo. So the Iranian influence that McCain warned about in his World Affairs Council speech has already been brought into the Balkans by the Clintons, in a policy that he supported all along.

 If you have noticed the evidence that the Arab/Muslim bloc of nations benefited from the Clinton policy in the former Yugoslavia, then you have grasped an essential truth about what has led to the current precarious state of affairs. It should be noted that Osama bin Laden, who was accused of supporting the Muslim extremists in Bosnia and Kosovo, would go on to order an attack on the U.S. on 9/11, killing nearly 3,000 of our fellow citizens. So he is clearly not grateful for the U.S. helping his Muslim brothers.

 The lesson, which McCain says he recognizes in Iraq, is that the terrorists cannot be appeased. But he wants to appease the Muslim extremists, backed by bin Laden, in Kosovo.

 The mystery is why President Bush, who authorized our soldiers to fight Muslim extremists in Iraq, embarked on this policy to accommodate them in Kosovo, and why McCain backs this wrong-headed approach. Some may see a conspiracy in this, but I prefer the stupidity theory of history. I don't think our foreign policy elites, and the politicians they control, are that smart about what constitutes the national security interest of the U.S. Bush may be under the manipulation of career bureaucrats in the State Department. They seem to have an inordinate influence on McCain as well. 

Since the Democrats won't quarrel with McCain or Bush on this unfolding catastrophe, it is up to what used to be called an "adversary press" to raise this uncomfortable foreign policy problem. It is an emergency because another war could be on the horizon. This "adversary press" now includes, more than ever, conservative commentators and bloggers. But some of those blogs seem to be running more and more "McCain for President" advertisements. This is a bad sign.

McCain, in his Wednesday speech, seemed to go out of his way to offend the Russian government, making it clear that he doesn't regard the regime there as a democracy. He even wants to exclude Russia from the G-8 group. Russia, McCain said, does not qualify as a member of what he proposes as a global "League of Democracies." But how can democracies survive if their countries face dismemberment by groups of nations and alliances acting outside of established and acceptable modes of conduct? How does it benefit the U.S. to increase the membership of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) by adding states such as Bosnia and Kosovo?

Russia, which is promising to go to the aid of the Serbs remaining in Kosovo, has recognized the danger to its own territorial integrity. It doesn't want to see Chechnya, another potential member of the OIC, inspired to more violence in order to attract recognition as an independent Muslim state like Kosovo. A war with NATO forces in Kosovo cannot be ruled out.

Then the situation may get some serious media attention. 

If foreign policy is McCain's strong suit, we are in serious trouble. His policy is the same as that of Democrats Hillary and Obama. And yet McCain says that Russia has a deficit of democracy.