Bank
system in UAE under review
Our Banking Bureau
22 October 2001
New Delhi: The
United Arab Emirates’ banking practices are under review after
government officials said they believe the financial system was
used as a transfer point for the suspects of the 11 September
attacks in the United States, CNN has reported.
The review stems from the fact that a man believed to be one of
the financial chiefs for suspected terrorist mastermind Osama bin
Laden went to Dubai, the UAE commercial centre, from Qatar in late
June and remained until 12 September, when he flew to Karachi,
Pakistan.
Investigative sources say just prior to the 11 September attacks,
three of the suspected hijackers sent more than $15,000 to a man
known as Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawasawi, a man investigators say stayed
in Dubai for two months and is believed to have been one of the al
Qaeda money men behind the attacks.
The UAE government said earlier in October
that two days before the attacks on the World Trade Center and the
Pentagon, a man it then identified only as a Saudi Arabian
passport holder had received wired payments from three of the
hijackers - Waleed M Alshehri; Marwan Al-Shehhi, who is believed
to have been at the controls of the second plane that crashed into
the World Trade Center; and Mohamed Atta. Atta is believed to have
been the commander of the 19 hijackers, and Shehhi is the only
confirmed citizen of the UAE among them.
Investigators now say they believe that the man who wired the
three hijackers’ money was al-Hawasawi. US investigators allege
that Atta received $100,000 in start-up money wired from the UAE
to banks in Florida to underwrite the plot.
“Atta was like any adult expatriate in the UAE,” Sultan Nasser
al Suwaidi, governor of the Central Bank of the UAE, told CNN. “I'm
sure people could not predict two years ago that he would become a
hijacker and a terrorist.”
Al Suwaidi said Atta opened his account and closed his account one
year ago, and his account was not with the Dubai Islamic Bank - it
was with Citibank. “If Citibank was not able to predict the
future of Mohamed Atta, I don't think anybody can,” al Suwaidi
said, pointing to the anti-money laundering laws the US bank
follows.
UAE officials said they have found no bank accounts linked to
individuals or organisations on two lists provided to them by the
US. But they say they are ready to
help. Complicating the investigation is a matter of language
translation. Names supplied in English could correspond to various
names when translated into Arabic. Many individuals carry the same
name. So without middle initials or dates of birth, banks run the
risk of freezing the wrong bank account, officials say.
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