Posted on 10/20/2001 3:44:35 PM PDT by freedomnews
Few Checks on Saudis Coming to U.S.
By LARRY MARGASAK, Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) - The U.S. government believes as many as eight of the 19 hijackers in the Sept. 11 attacks came from Saudi Arabia, but it still routinely issues tens of thousands of visas to Saudis each year without interviews or extensive background checks.
Far tougher conditions are imposed on other visitors from the Middle East.
On busy days, overwhelmed U.S. Embassy officials issue hundreds of Saudi visas in Riyadh and Jeddah. No special requirements are imposed because, in the past, Saudis had a good record of complying with visa requirements.
In contrast, Iranians must wait 30 days for background checks. Iraqis must await approval from Washington. Syrian applicants are given special scrutiny, an effort to identify any interested in sensitive technical information.
All U.S. consulates must run names through a State Department database of people with past immigration problems.
For Saudis this is mostly routine, although U.S. officials who recently served there estimated they made a half-dozen requests a day for further checks.
Saudis were issued 60,508 visas in the last fiscal year. The figure includes Saudis who applied from other countries. This compares to 21,811 for Jordanians, 48,883 for Egyptians, 143,297 for Israelis, 14,344 for Syrians, 24,932 for Iranians and 2,992 for Iraqis.
Since the attacks, the State Department has told U.S. posts across the globe to review visa procedures and ``see where things may be strengthened,'' a department official said.
The FBI (news - web sites) has said as many as eight of the hijackers may have been Saudis, although the use of false names in some cases has made a precise accounting impossible.
In addition, Saudi Arabia appeared 56 times on a U.S. list of 370 individuals and organizations with suspected links to the attacks. The list was made public by financial authorities in Finland.
``Our major concern was whether an applicant was going to come back. In most cases Saudis came back because they're very tied to their country,'' said Joseph Nowell, deputy consul-general at the U.S. Embassy in Riyadh from 1998 through September 2000.
``The Saudis are good risks,'' he said. ``Has the risk changed? Yes, but I'm not sure what I'd do about it.''
Wyche Fowler, the U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia until March, agreed, ``We had almost no problems with Saudis skipping out on visas or overstaying their visa time.''
Nowell and other officials who worked in the embassy said that before Sept. 11, there was little discussion of the possibility that Saudis might visit the United States to commit terrorist acts. Officials were more concerned about threats against the embassy, and other U.S. targets in Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf.
A database available to U.S. consulates has 5.7 million names of those with past immigration problems. It includes some law enforcement and intelligence information. The FBI has refused for years to give consulates direct access to its crime database, arguing it only should be accessible to law enforcement and criminal justice agencies.
Even if the database had a better link to law enforcement records, that still would not necessarily prevent terrorists from getting visas because they might not have criminal records in the United States.
And even the best of databases would not catch potential terrorists who sneak into the United States.
The Immigration and Naturalization Service has said 15 of the 19 suspected hijackers entered this country legally while there are no records of the other four. Those entering legally had the kinds of visas routinely granted each year to millions of foreign tourists, students, workers and business travelers.
The Saudi government would not oppose stricter enforcement of visa policy, said Nail Al-Jubeir, a spokesman at the Saudi Embassy in Washington.
``There needs be some kind of control even for our own sake,'' he said. ``We want it to be whatever the U.S. government deems necessary.''
Al-Jubeir said his government has not been able to confirm how many hijackers were from Saudi Arabia because of the use of false names. He said he had no information on those named on the Finnish list, but cautioned it may ruin the reputations of innocent people.
U.S. embassy employees who are nationals from a host country are permitted to process visa applications, but only a U.S. official can issue a visa. During busy periods in the Riyadh embassy, four people with decision-making authority issued more than 900 visas a day, Nowell said. That did not include visas granted by the consulate in Jeddah.
The embassy official must check each applicant's name against the State Department's database. Nowell said the database sometimes produces names of 100 questionable individuals, as a possible match, each time a visa applicant's name is punched in.
In almost all cases, the official decides the applicant's name does not match any of the questionable names in the database and grants the visa, he said.
The Associated Press
10/20/01 7:20 AM
MIAMI (AP) -- An immigration supervisor was accused of taking a $6,000 bribe to illegally admit a Colombian woman flying into Miami, and his indictment hints at more payoffs for illegal entry.
Fredy Barragan, an Immigration and Naturalization Service supervisor at Miami International Airport since 1997, was held on $200,000 bond on charges that carry a possible 15-year prison sentence.
His wife Katherine and his sister-in-law Monica Andrioli were charged with him in an alleged alien-smuggling conspiracy. The indictment, unsealed Friday, outlines dates but has few details.
"We will do everything, and I mean everything, in our power to bring these people to justice," INS district director John Bulger said. "It is a painful process for the rest of our employees who don't break the law, but it is a necessary one."
Barragan was charged with taking a $6,000 bribe for stamping Colombian citizen Luisa Hoyos' passport as a permanent U.S. resident in 1997. Hoyos' husband paid $4,000 more in June for a confidential report about her and backdating her passport stamp, according to the indictment.
Andrioli allegedly told someone in July that Fredy Barragan "typically charged $6,000 to $7,000 for each person he smuggled into the United States," the indictment said.
Andrioli, who faces a possible five-year prison sentence, was accused of taking trips to Cali, Colombia, to meet with Hoyos to arrange her trip to Miami and accept the bribe in 1997.
Katherine Barragan, who could receive a 15-year sentence if convicted, was accused of collecting the $4,000 bribe and talked about erasing entries from Hoyos' immigration record.
The Barragans had not immediately hired a lawyer Friday.
FOREIGN COOPERATION
Egypt and Saudi Arabia Won't Supply List of Passengers Flying to U.S.
By ROBERT PEAR
ASHINGTON, Oct. 17 — Federal officials said today that Saudi Arabia and Egypt had refused to cooperate with American efforts to identify terrorists and other criminals on aircraft flying to the United States.
Ninety-four airlines cooperate, but Saudi Arabian Airlines and Egypt Air are among a handful that do not electronically provide passenger lists when planes begin flights to the United States, the officials said.
The new customs commissioner, Robert C. Bonner, said airlines should be required to collect and provide names and other basic information about passengers traveling to the United States from abroad.
"It should be mandatory," Mr. Bonner said. "It should be a condition for getting landing rights in the United States. We now receive this information on 70 to 80 percent of passengers on arriving international flights. That's unacceptable. We should have the information on 100 percent of passengers."
Bush administration officials said they would soon propose such a requirement. The idea has support from members of Congress in both parties, but it has been caught in a parliamentary logjam, with several committees claiming authority.
For more than a decade, the United States has been increasing the use of computers to screen passengers before they arrive in this country.
Airlines cooperating with federal law enforcement authorities send data electronically to the United States when international flights depart for this country. The Customs Service and the Immigration and Naturalization Service check the names against "watch lists" of suspected terrorists and criminals.
Inspectors from the two agencies can then identify high-risk passengers so they and their baggage can be scrutinized more closely after the flights arrive.
Airlines participating in this program, known as the Advance Passenger Information System, receive some benefits in return. Most of their passengers can pass more quickly through customs and immigration inspections because the names have already been checked — a task that must otherwise be done by law enforcement officers at American airports, after the flights arrive.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation says that most of the hijackers in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks were Saudis. One of the ringleaders, Mohamed Atta, was an Egyptian.
A spokesman for the Saudi Embassy said his country was not in any hurry to sign up for the Advance Passenger Information System.
"At this time," the spokesman said, "hundreds of Saudi citizens are being detained and questioned with regard to the hijackings. A lot of them are innocent people. That number would probably quadruple if we shared advance information on air passengers with the United States."
The spokesman, who discussed the matter on condition of anonymity, said American authorities often mixed up the names of Saudis. Hundreds of Saudis have the same first and last names as some of the hijackers, he said, and some of the hijackers were apparently using stolen identity documents. The Saudi government has hired lawyers for many of its citizens detained in this country, the spokesman said.
The Egyptian ambassador, M. Nabil Fahmy, said he did not know why Egypt Air refused to cooperate.
"The Egyptian government is the ultimate owner of the airline, but does not manage it," Mr. Fahmy said. "The airline makes its own decisions."
He said he thought the advance screening was "a good procedure." Senators Edward M. Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts, and Sam Brownback, Republican of Kansas, are writing a bill that would tighten immigration controls to keep terrorists out of the United States. The bill would increase security on the nation's borders and would require airlines to participate in the Advance Passenger Information System.
Mr. Kennedy is chairman of the Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration. Mr. Brownback is the senior Republican on the subcommittee.
Representative John L. Mica, Republican of Florida, also wants to require airlines to share their passenger lists with the United States government before their planes land here. Mr. Mica, the chairman of the House Transportation Subcommittee on Aviation, is proposing such a requirement in a bill on aviation safety.
When airlines participate in the screening program, they provide the Customs Service with information obtained from travelers checking in at foreign airports. The information generally includes the full name, date of birth, nationality and passport number for each passenger.
Before a plane's arrival in the United States, the information is checked against the combined federal law enforcement database, the Interagency Border Inspection System, which includes data from the Customs Service, the I.N.S., the F.B.I., the Secret Service and more than 15 other federal agencies.
Based on the results of those searches, "we select a few people who we want to reach out and touch," said Harold H. Zagar, chief inspector of the Customs Service at Dulles International Airport.
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