Terrorism Inc.

CAN you picture Osama Bin Laden, the world’s most wanted terrorist, trying to earn a dollar by selling fresh vegetables at your local market to fund al Qaeda? As unlikely as that scenario  may be, senior policy analyst at the Washington DC-based Rand Corporation, Dr Angel Rabasa, says  terrorists worldwide have been seeking out legitimate businesses to finance their operations and advance their respective causes. Speaking at a the monthly meeting of the American Chamber of Commerce of Trinidad and Tobago at the Hilton Trinidad recently, Dr Rabasa said within recent years there has been a growing nexus between terrorism and transnational crime. He explained that during the Cold War, terrorist groups and freedom fighters derived their financial and logistical support from either the United States or the Soviet Union.

However when the Cold War ended, Rabasa said support for these groups dried up because of the disintegration of the Soviet Union and a loss of interest by the Americans in supporting some of these groups. In light of these developments, Dr Rabasa explained that terrorists and freedom fighters viewed their causes as a business and started to think like businessmen in order to survive. “In business terms, how to find a new successful business model was a matter of survival. What we see here is an adjustment, finding a new business model,” he said. “Some groups could not find a new business model and they disappeared. Other groups adapted by finding alternative means of financing themselves,” he said.

Among the groups who successfully made the change are the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), the UNITA rebels of Angola and the Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka. Rabasa said terrorist groups today mostly rely on illegitimate enterprises such as drug, human and arms trafficking to finance themselves. In the case of the Tigers, intelligence officials in Canada, Australia and Britain say the group “is playing a pivotal role in illegal human smuggling, especially to Canada.” In June 2000, the Sri Lankan criminal investigating department, he said, uncovered one major smuggling ring involving an estimated 600 to 700 people that had been trafficked to the European Union. Even after taking into account overhead costs, the net profits from this operation would be in the millions of dollars, Rabasa said.

Closer to home, the analyst said intelligence data indicates that the triple border region of Argentina, Paraguay and Brazil is “the most important source of financing centre of Islamic terrorism outside of the Middle East”. This area, according to Rabasa, is a prime example of how terrorists use legitimate businesses to fund their operations. He disclosed that  in a particular Paraguayan city there is “a mosaic of businesses owned mostly by merchants of Arab origin and the city is billed by Argentinian and Brazilian authorities as a regional hub where organised criminal enterprises, insurgent groups and terrorist organisations enjoy safe haven and an opportunity for strategic alliances. “Smuggling and black market operations are principal activities. Paraguayan police estimate that 70 percent of the cars were purchased on the black market with at least a portion of the profits going to terrorist groups,” Dr Rabasa said.  He added that wire transfers from the triple border area to the Middle East “show that this is a very widespread phenomenon.”

Rabasa said in 2002 two Hezbollah members were extradited from Brazil to Paraguay to answer tax evasion charges and one of these  was the co-owner of a large shopping mall in Paraguay, which intelligence sources believe, was used as a front for fund-raising and recruitment. He said that persons wishing to acquire an AK-47 assault rifle from this area could have it delivered directly to them for a price of US$375 (which includes shipping costs). “There is legitimate business and there is crime. Sometimes what happens is the terrorist groups could invest in and own or participate in perfectly legitimate business,” he said. Al Qaeda, he said, runs legitimate businesses, including vegetable farms in East Africa, “so there is nothing really to look for. It’s not a question of what type of business they involve themselves in but who is involved in what businesses.”

In that context, Rabasa stressed that tracking the financial flows from legitimate businesses is “a very critical matter” in determining whether criminals or terrorists are using that business as a front. However he conceded that while US authorities are placing a lot of emphasis in this area, “sometimes the money is very hard to trace.”  “The terrorists learn many ways of avoiding detection. They would transfer money in amounts just below the threshold. “They use ATMS to transfer money back and forth and they use commodities,” the analyst said. However all is not lost. Rabasa emphasised that the best way which all nations could combat terrorism and extract this cancer from the body of legitimate businesses is through information and cooperation across international borders.