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Bin Laden maintains accounts in Cyprus

Special to World Tribune.com
MIDDLE EAST NEWSLINE
Tuesday, April 10, 2001

NICOSIA — The Russian mafia does it. So does deposed President Slobodan Milosevic.

Now, fugitive Saudi billionaire Osama Bin Laden joins the club of those who keep their money in the Republic of Cyprus.

Cypriot sources said Bin Laden's group maintains bank accounts in Nicosia. Bin Laden also uses Cyprus as a transit point to export Sudanese exports, such as peanuts, to Europe.

The state-run CyBC television said the assertion came in testimony by a Sudanese defendant in the trial of Bin Laden aides in New York. Jamat Ahmet Alfato told the U.S. district court in Manhattan that a Bin Laden front company, Arketa, deposited income from its Sudanese operations in Cyprus. Arketa was founded in 1989.

Alfato asserted that his company bought weapons for Bin Laden operations in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the United States and Yemen. Cyprus might have also been a target.

The Cypriot state television said Alfato's testimony was discussed between Washington and Nicosia. Cyprus has been identified as a leading location for money-laundering by organized crime.

Cypriot authorities said they are investigating the reports of Bin Laden's bank accounts.

In Los Angeles, another suspected Bin Laden aide was convicted in a U.S. district court of a 1999 plot to bomb targets in the United States. Ahmed Ressam faces 130 years in prison.

Tuesday, April 10, 2001


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