>>Charity Funds Said to Provide Clues to Alleged Terrorist Plot - Officials Say Money for Attacks Came From Earthquake Relief
By Joshua Partlow and Kamran Khan
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, August 15, 2006; A10
LONDON, Aug. 14 -- The transfer of millions of dollars from Britain to a Pakistani charity working on earthquake relief last year helped investigators uncover the alleged plot to blow up airplanes bound for the United States, according to two senior Pakistani intelligence officials.
The officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the ongoing investigation, said that a large portion of the money sent from Britain to the charity was siphoned off and ultimately used to prepare for the attacks. The officials said that about 5 million British pounds, or $10 million, was transferred to Pakistan, but that less than half was used for relief operations after the earthquake last October, which killed tens of thousands of people.
"British intelligence smelled a foul play the moment the transfer was made in December last year," said one of the senior intelligence officials, who is directly involved in the investigation.
"The innocent Pakistani souls in Britain who contributed so generously for the victims of the earthquake didn't know that their money would actually be used for one of the biggest terrorist operations," the other Pakistani official said.
British police are holding 23 suspects, most of them London-based Muslim men in their twenties. Intelligence officials have said that at least 17 of the suspects have family ties to Pakistan.
A spokesman for Scotland Yard declined to comment on the money transfer.
The Pakistani officials did not identify the charity in question. The New York Times reported Monday that investigators are focusing on Jamaat-ud-Dawa, a Pakistani charity that is a front for Lashkar-i-Taiba, an Islamic militant group.
In 2002, Pakistan's president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, banned Lashkar-i-Taiba, but the group renamed itself Jamaat-ud-Dawa as a way to evade sanctions, according to the State Department. Lashkar-i-Taiba is one of the largest and best-trained groups fighting Indian forces in the disputed Himalayan province of Kashmir. Lashkar-i-Taiba has been linked by U.S. authorities to al-Qaeda.
According to Michael Clarke, a terrorism specialist at King's College London, Jamaat-ud-Dawa played a considerable role in helping the residents of Pakistani-controlled Kashmir and northern Pakistan recover from the earthquake, which struck a region that is home to several camps and bases belonging to militant Kashmiri groups and other radical organizations linked to al-Qaeda.
The chaos after the quake allowed the Pakistani government to develop intelligence agents in the area, learn more about the scope of the groups and try to undermine their support, he said. The groups used the quake to transfer money in and out of the affected region in an attempt to increase their influence, Clarke said.
"Within a week, it was being said this actually is quite an opportunity for both the government and jihadis to reposition themselves in a lot of ways," Clarke said.
Jamaat-ud-Dawa "certainly does legitimate charity work, but there's a lot of suspicion that surrounds it because of where it operates," he said.
Paul Wilkinson, director of the Center for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland, said reports that Jamaat-ud-Dawa funded the suspects in the terrorism plot are "very, very credible."
The organization "is recognized as being an important source of funding," he said. "I think authorities feel that quite a bit of money has passed through their hands."
"We know charities are used for this kind of terrorist purpose very often," Wilkinson said.
A spokesman for Jamaat-ud-Dawa, Abdullah Muntazer, disputed reports that his group had funded suspects in the alleged plot in Britain and said, "We condemn every kind of terrorism." The organization is "totally based in Pakistan" and has no network or affiliations with Britain, he said. Jamaat-ud-Dawa operates charities, runs more than 100 schools and clinics, and has about 1,000 offices in Pakistan, Muntazer said.
"So the government of Pakistan is totally convinced and aware of our activities, and there is no investigation," he said.
Muntazer confirmed that Hafeez Muhammad Sayeed, an official with the organization, was recently placed under house arrest but said it did not have anything to do with the alleged London plot. Muntazer said the group has wanted to stage rallies in Pakistan but the government opposes the plan, which led to the arrest.
"This was a bone of contention, so the government put him under house arrest to keep him from holding the public gathering," he said.
Also Monday, Muslim leaders met with Ruth Kelly, the British secretary of state for communities and local government. The Muslim Council of Britain called for a "reassessment" of British foreign policy, particularly in terms of Iraq and the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, to see "whether they're working or not," according to the organization's spokesman, Inayat Bunglawala.
Many Muslims in Britain have contended that the country's Middle East policy has inflamed radicalism and has put civilians at risk of further terrorist attacks.
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