Sunday, September 18, 2005
Designation: terrorism
Court links Columbia charity, terrorists .
I think Akeel makes a valid point.
...KANSAS CITY - A Missouri charity financed terrorism and is connected to a similarly named organization in Sudan, a federal judge in Washington, D.C., has concluded.
The findings came Thursday in a 36-page order from U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton in which he threw out a lawsuit filed by the Islamic American Relief Agency-USA, which is based in Columbia. The charity had sought to thaw its assets, which the Department of the Treasury froze last year...
...Akeel acknowledged that IARA-USA occasionally had partnered with the Sudanese charity on individual projects. And he pointed out that the United Nations Children’s Fund contracted with the Sudanese group to rebuild three schools in Iraq. After a U.S. bank declined to process the check because of the terrorism designation, UNICEF backed away from the contract.
Akeel asked why the U.S. government had not also sanctioned UNICEF.
"They had a contract with IARA in Sudan two months after the raid," Akeel said.
The judge, however, did not see a problem...
I think Akeel makes a valid point.
