Al Qaeda Works Around Saudi Efforts to Combat Terror

by Mickey McCarter Wednesday, 30 September 2009

Terrorists go to Yemen, circumvent financing blocks

While Saudi Arabia has disrupted the activities of Al Qaeda within its borders over the past several years, the terrorist organization has shifted more of its resources to neighboring Yemen, congressional investigators reported Tuesday.

In addition, Saudi Arabia has cracked down on terrorist financing-by restricting charitable contributions that can go overseas, for example-but terrorists have been able to circumvent some of these actions by using cash carriers and other means, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) said in a report, titled "Combating Terrorism: US Agencies Report Progress Countering Terrorism and Its Financing in Saudi Arabia, but Continued Focus on Counter-Terrorism Financing Efforts Needed."

Good diplomatic relations between Saudi Arabia and the United States, spanning more than 70 years, were weakened by the 9/11 terrorist attacks, which were perpetuated by 19 terrorists-15 of whom were Saudi citizens.

Saudi Arabia and the United States began to collaborate on counter-terrorism strategy after 9/11 with the objectives of stopping Al Qaeda's activities within Saudi Arabia and disrupting sources of terrorist financing within the country also, noted the GAO report, which examined these efforts since 2005.

To support these objectives, the US Department of State lists performance targets in support of them. Recently, the State Department has removed some of these performance targets from its Mission Strategic Plans, however, because progress toward the targets were made or the targets were deemed infeasible, GAO stated.

But as a result of its review, GAO recommended that the secretary of State reinstate targets related to disrupting terrorist financing to activities outside of the Said Arabia. The State Department agreed that the US mission in Saudi Arabia should do so.

From fiscal 2006-2009, the Mission Strategic Plans of the State Department have listed performance targets to include "providing security training to the Saudi government, strengthening Saudi financial institutions, and implementation of relevant Saudi regulations," the report said.

But while some progress has been made in shutting down Al Qaeda operations within Saudi Arabia, terrorists have been successful at getting around some of the restrictions on terrorism financing, the report continued.

A State Department assessment from April 2009 described the building of a US-Saudi Arabia anti-terrorism effort as "on target." But Saudi Arabia's success at stopping Al Qaeda's activities within its own borders have driven the group to put more of its operations in Yemen, the GAO report said.

Furthermore, the Saudi government has moved to hamper terrorist financing in the country through regulating charitable contributions overseas and prosecuting individuals who finance terrorism, the report stated.

But terrorists have continued to work around these restrictions as well.

"US officials remain concerned about the ability of Saudi individuals and charitable organizations to support terrorism outside of Saudi Arabia, and noted limited Saudi enforcement capacity and terrorists' use of cash couriers as challenges," the report read.

Due to these difficulties, the State Department agreed to reinstate targets relating to combating terrorism financing in Saudi Arabia.

Source: HS TODAY