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Saudi elite linked to bin Laden financial empire
The Boston Herald ^ | Sunday, October 14, 2001 | Jonathan Wells, Jack Meyers and Maggie Mulvihill

Posted on 10/14/2001 6:27:18 AM PDT by SlickWillard

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1 posted on 10/14/2001 6:27:18 AM PDT by SlickWillard
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To: SlickWillard
"Hybridon, a small Massachusetts biomedical company engaged in advanced DNA research."

Has anything happened since this was revealed a month ago?

2 posted on 10/14/2001 6:31:55 AM PDT by Diogenesis
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To: SlickWillard
Very interesting, but incomplete. Where is the info on the Bush family's and the Carlyle Group's connections to these people and these banks?
3 posted on 10/14/2001 7:20:16 AM PDT by Anochka
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To: SlickWillard
bttt
4 posted on 10/14/2001 7:36:31 AM PDT by independentmind
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To: SlickWillard
"You are either with us or you are with the terrorists." GW Bush.
5 posted on 10/14/2001 8:02:31 AM PDT by truthandlife
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To: SlickWillard
It is now abundantly clear that the Saudi people hate the west and that they are a major supplier of the "talent-pool" for Al Queada.
6 posted on 10/14/2001 8:10:18 AM PDT by Nachum
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To: SlickWillard; Cicero; aristeides; Wallaby; OKCSubmariner; Hoplite
bump. Note a common thread in Bin Laden's financial dealings is that they all seem to be tied to an extended family member or in-law. This is in stark contrast to his political and military maneuverings. I would note that this may provide a means of tracking his actions and intentions. Also note the pattern of his investments and terrorist activities; USS Cole/Yemen, construction, aviation training, telecommunications, biotechnology.

The $24 million supposedly seized is a fraction of the money we are talking about here. It was bait, left to satisfy the western media when the western goverments had to take action. Note every time we go after real money in say, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE, Pakistan, there is an inexplicable delay as the local government seeks clarification. During that period, I'll bet the money is being wired around the globe to protect it from seizure.

7 posted on 10/14/2001 10:14:40 AM PDT by Ranger
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To: SlickWillard
Hybridon, a small Massachusetts biomedical company engaged in advanced DNA research. Yahia M. A. bin Laden is a major stockholder in the firm, as is Abdela bin Mahfouz. Abdulrahman bin Mahfouz is a former shareholder.

It's been pointed out before, and there is at least one whole thread on this, but it bears repeating. Bin Laden has connections to a Massachusetts biomedical lab

8 posted on 10/14/2001 10:16:42 AM PDT by Lion's Cub
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To: SlickWillard

Wahhabi

Research this sect of Islam, it will help to put together the pieces of this whole mess.

Bin Laden is a Wahhabi, ibn Saud is Wahhabi. Bin Laden's problem with ibn Saud is that they allowed Western forces to desecrate Islam's homeland during the Gulf War.

As a result, bin Laden wants to overthrow the ibn Saud family, and so do many others in Saudi Arabia - albeit for different reasons. That's why so much Saudi money is going to bin Laden. It's a case of "who's a better (read: strict) Muslim" than who, with power and $$$ mixed in for good measure.

9 posted on 10/14/2001 10:35:24 AM PDT by Bosco
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To: Ranger
Thanks for the bump. I just linked to this article on yesterday's thread:
10 posted on 10/14/2001 10:48:47 AM PDT by Wallaby
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To: SlickWillard; Betty Jo; aristeides; Ranger; Hamiltonian; Boyd; Uncle Bill
Kill dot net German businessmen and convicted hacker, Kim Schmitz, who has placed a $ 10 million bounty on Osama bin Ladens head has started www.kill.net to recruit talent to get at terrorist accounts and websites. The Young Intelligent Hackers Against Terror group which he hopes to raise, is to track terrorist organisations accounts, transactions and financial supporters and supply the data to the US authorities. Schmitz claims he has already handed over Al-Qaida account details in Sudans Al Shamal Islamic Bank to the FBI.
The Statesman (India); October 11, 2001
11 posted on 10/14/2001 10:55:38 AM PDT by Wallaby
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To: Wallaby
Oh, I love it! Wish I was young, intelligent and a hacker!However,we can all contribute in our own way!
12 posted on 10/14/2001 11:01:50 AM PDT by Betty Jo
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To: SlickWillard
Drill for our own oil and freeze Saudi assets.
13 posted on 10/14/2001 11:04:30 AM PDT by boycott
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To: Diogenesis; Lion's Cub; aristeides; OKCSubmariner; Nita Nupress; Ann Archy; backhoe
One could say that the Anthrax mess could be laid on Hybridons terrorist ownership doorstep!

When Bin Ladens and Mahfouzs own a company that does work in antisense as antidotes for bioweapon terrorism,the jump to the conclusion that the company was bought to facilitate the bio war effort is a very tiny leap!

When will HYBRIDON be siezed?

When will its $$$$$ be frozen?

How long will a biological products company owned by Bin Ladens and Mahfouzs continue to do business in Cambridge, Mass?

14 posted on 10/14/2001 11:09:25 AM PDT by Betty Jo
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To: SlickWillard
This might explain why we haven't heard that much coverage lately about suspicious stock and option trading the Friday before the attacks that probably netted tens of millions or hundreds of millions of dollars to people with advance knowledge

I strongly suspect the reason that this hasn't been more prominent is that the money trail leads directly into the bowels of the Saudi royal family

15 posted on 10/14/2001 11:17:13 AM PDT by SauronOfMordor
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To: SlickWillard
A friend of mine has done a great deal of business in Saudi Arabia over the past 25 years. He has lived there months at a time in compounds as dictated by the Saudi government. He knows many so called Westernized Saudis.

He talked to many of his Saudi business contacts after 911. Without exception, they all said they were happy that the US has now been punished. The Saudis are not our friends.

16 posted on 10/14/2001 11:20:31 AM PDT by stripes1776
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To: SauronOfMordor; independentmind; Ranger; aristeides; Betty Jo
Not for commercial use. Solely to be used for the educational purposes of research and open discussion.

EXCLUSIVE:HAUGHEY'S LUNCH DATE WITH BIN LADEN'S BROTHER-IN-LAW
MARTIN FITZPATRICK
Irish Independent
September 30, 2001


THE fabulously wealthy Saudi Arabian banker who bought 11 Irish passports for friends and family a decade ago is the brother-in-law of Osama bin Laden and has been accused of being a facilitator for those who provided funds to fuel bin Laden's terror network.


Sheikh Mahfouz invested in a number of important Irish ventures as part of the GBP20m investment commitment he made when he got the passports. He gave GBP3m to fund development projects at Kerry Airport.
Sheikh Khalid bin Mahfouz, who sensationally purchased the Irish passports in 1990 in a secret deal handled personally by the then Taoiseach, Charles Haughey, has spent time under house arrest in a military hospital in the Saudi city of Taif, apparently as punishment for alleged involvement in channelling millions of dollars to bin Laden, chief suspect for the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon.

Sheikh Mahfouz's son, Abdul Rahman bin Mahfouz, who was also one of those who obtained Irish citizenship in the 1990 transaction, has been a subject of controversy too. He was a member of the board of a charity called Blessed Relief, based in Sudan. Members of this charity are suspected of having links with an assassination attempt in 1995 on the Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. Sheikh Mahfouz invested in a number of important Irish ventures as part of the GBP20m investment commitment he made when he got the passports. He gave GBP3m to fund development projects at Kerry Airport. He is understood to have handed over a further GBP3m to help pay for projects associated with companies owned by the Millstreet entrepreneur Noel C Duggan.

Mahfouz, once said by Forbes magazine, the international business journal, to have a personal fortune of GBP2.5bn (positioning him as the 125th wealthiest man in the world), was the owner of National Commerce Bank (NCB) of Saudi Arabia, once the world's largest privately-owned bank. The company was also banker to the Saudi royal family. He is married to a sister of Osama bin Laden.

Senior US intelligence officials are said to believe that Sheikh Mahfouz was part of a series of transactions during the late Nineties in which a number of top Saudi business executives ordered the National Commercial Bank to transfer personal funds, along with $ 3m diverted from a Saudi pension fund, to New York and London banks. The money was deposited into the accounts of Islamic charities, including Blessed Relief and another suspected front for bin Laden, Islamic Relief, according to the report.

The intelligence sources said the businessmen, who were then worth more than $ 5bn, were paying bin Laden "protection money" to stave off attacks on their businesses in Saudi Arabia. The money transfers were discovered after the Saudi royal family ordered an audit of NCB and Khalid bin Mahfouz.

Mahfouz was forced into retirement from his banking activities. Reports from London last week suggested he was still in a military hospital.

Khalid bin Mahfouz first came to public notice in Ireland in the summer of 1994 when the Sunday Independent revealed exclusively that he and an associate had received 11 passports for themselves and their family members in 1990. The circumstances in which the Saudi banker received the passports, in the aftermath of the Kuwaiti invasion, became the subvject of considerable public and political debate.

Sheikh Mahfouz was subsequently indicted by a grand jury in New York in relation to defrauding investors of the failed banking giant BCCI. This development raised even more eyebrows, when eventually, in 1994, it was disclosed that he had been granted Irish naturalisation papers.

Documents with the Moriarty tribunal suggested that the Mahfouz passports got a special priority in government circles when their issue came up for decision.

The documents were presented with considerable formality. A special lunch was arranged in the Shelbourne hotel in Dublin, which the then Taoiseach, Charles Haughey, personally attended for the purpose of handing over the documents to the Saudi businessmen.

The paperwork had been handled by the then Minister for Justice, Ray Burke. Burke's involvement later became a serious political liability for him. It emerged that he signed the certificates approving the issuing of the 11 passports on a Saturday and that the requirement of an oath of fidelity was waived. His involvement in the affair was one of the matters which created the pressure that led to his resignation.

Much debate has followed on the nature of the control that Mr Haughey exercised on the passports-for-investment scheme. He was said, even by political rivals, to put prospective investors through the wringer. But there was no requirement under the original scheme to say how many Irish jobs would be created in exchange for the passports.

However, the Mahfouz money that was paid for the passports has been fairly well tracked down. A "substantial" investment (believed to have been as much as GBP4m) went into a company called Leisure Holdings which was chaired by the head of the Kerry Group, Denis Brosnan, and backed by a number of senior Irish businessmen, including John Magnier and JP McManus.

Ironically, one of the biggest investments made by Leisure Holdings was in the David Lloyd chain of tennis clubs in Britain, hardly in line with the Irish job creation or job maintenance fundamentals of the passport scheme.

Mahfouz money went into Kerry Airport ("a great deal for the airport," Denis Brosnan declared) and also into the local entrepreneurial efforts of Noel C Duggan in Millstreet. However, Mr Duggan hastened to point out that this investment was later bought out.

The Saudi cash also went into Portarlington structural steel firm Butler Engineering, run by the late Pat Butler, a strong supporter of Mr Haughey and Fianna Fail.

As far as is known, Khalid bin Mahfouz never lived in Ireland as the original passport documents required him to do. He is known to have bought a house in Ireland, however, and listed this as his address when the grant of the naturalisation papers was listed in the Government publication, Iris Oifigiuil.

He and the other passport recipients named Glenmore House, Clonee, Co Meath, as their local residence. The house was the former home of a well-known Irish industrialist, Denis Coakley, who died several years prior to the passports affair.


17 posted on 10/14/2001 11:33:31 AM PDT by Wallaby
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To: Wallaby; OKCSubmariner; Nita Nupress; Ann Archy; backhoe; aristeides; mewzilla
Thanks for the article!

Mahfouz sure likes airports ,dosnt he?

Have you come up with "Camille Chebeir"?

He is the manager for Mahfouz investments.

Med-Emerg International owns two walk-in emergency clinics in Pearson Toronto Airport.

Mahfouz also owns a lot of the Port of Aden businesses!

I wonder if when I go to search "Argenbright"that held the security contrct for the airports in the WTC,that was actually sold to "Securicor" last year,which is owned by English Lords and such ,will really be a partial Mahfouz goodie?

18 posted on 10/14/2001 5:00:42 PM PDT by Betty Jo
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To: SauronOfMordor
That, and imo estimation, Russian & other organized crime.
19 posted on 10/14/2001 5:16:01 PM PDT by a history buff
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To: Wallaby
on it
20 posted on 10/15/2001 6:55:58 PM PDT by thinden
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