Author: Caroline Drees
Publication: ABC News
Date: April 4, 2006
URL: http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=1804826
Saudi Arabia must do a better job at ferreting
out major individual donors who continue to fund terrorism abroad, including
in Iraq, a top U.S. Treasury official said on Tuesday.
Stuart Levey, the Treasury's undersecretary
for terrorism and financial intelligence, said Saudi Arabia had made significant
strides in counterterrorism efforts in recent years and that the kingdom was
"doing an excellent job" fighting operatives of Osama bin Laden's
al Qaeda network at home.
But he told a hearing of the Senate Banking
Committee that concerns remained, including the existence of so-called "deep-pocket
donors" and the abuse of charities to fund militants.
"Is money leaving Saudi Arabia to fund
terrorism abroad? Yes," said Levey, who has traveled to Saudi Arabia
twice in the last two months. "Undoubtedly, some of that money is going
to Iraq. And it's going to Southeast Asia and it's going to any other place
where there are terrorists."
He said Saudi Arabia had taken steps to curb
terrorism financing, but had failed to set up a special charity commission
to regulate the sector, as it had pledged. He said rules implemented as a
stop-gap measure in the interim "haven't been uniformly implemented."
Levey said Saudi Arabia's fledgling Financial
Intelligence Unit, set up last year after much prodding from the United States,
was still not fully functional.
Financial Intelligence Units are government
agencies that collect, analyze and exchange financial information to help
fight money laundering and terrorism financing.
"What needs to happen is they need to
do financial investigations in a serious way in order to locate those deep-pocket
donors that are still funding terrorism abroad. And that's something which
is a concern that hasn't happened as robustly as it needs to happen,"
Levey said.
Banking Committee Chairman Richard Shelby,
an Alabama Republican, asked whether there was a gap between Saudi government
rhetoric and the implementation of policy.
Levey replied: "I've got to say that
there's a lag. … And we'll see if there's a gap."
