ABU DHABI Ñ The United States is training Gulf Cooperation Council
states to halt the financing of Islamic insurgency groups linked to Saudi
fugitive Osama Bin Laden.
U.S. officials said the effort is focused on Kuwait, Qatar and the
United Arab Emirates. They said delegations from the Justice Department,
Treasury Department and the FBI have been touring the Gulf and providing
briefings.
The goal, the officials said, is for the GCC to institute regulations
among its six members to ensure that the Persian Gulf region is not used as
a way-station for financing groups deemed as terrorists. They said
Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the UAE were classified as leading
centers of money-laundering for Bin Laden and his allies.
So far, Bahrain is the only GCC member that has imposed regulations
meant to combat money-laundering in accordance with international standards.
Bahrain has drafted the legislation along the lines of the global Financial
Action Task Force.
The money-laundering is said to employ money-changers or the hawala
system. The system allows for foreign workers in the Gulf to send their
salaries to their native countries.
"If hawala is being misused by some people, it cannot be countered by
the UAE alone," UAE Central Bank governor Sultan Bin Nasser Al Suwaidi said.
"It has to be tackled at the GCC level and all our countries are making
efforts to come out with a common system to make sure hawala is not misused.
Many Asians use it to remit money in all GCC countries."
