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To: lorne who wrote (19370)	2/26/2003 9:54:15 PM
From: lorne	Respond to of 23908

Saudi student arrested for anti-U.S. website Allegedly assisted Islamic group that praises suicide bombings February 26, 2003 The FBI and the Joint Terrorism Task Force arrested a Saudi Arabian man studying computer security at the University of Idaho who is charged with helping set up a website for an Islamic group that urges violence against the United States. Sami Omar Al-Hussayen, 34, was taken into custody at 4 a.m. at his apartment on the university's campus in Moscow, Idaho, according to a Spokane, Wash., television station. Dozens of agents with warrants searched several locations, said NBC affiliate KHQ, including the school's engineering lab and off-campus apartment. The Saudi citizen is charged with supporting the Michigan-based Islamic Assembly of North America, or IANA. The IANA says its aim is to coordinate the efforts of many groups on the continent engaged in the propagation of Islam, or dawah. Websites operated by the group praise suicide bombings and promote the use of airplanes as terror weapons, the indictment said. The organization's office in Ann Arbor, Mich., did not answer calls seeking comment on the arrest today. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, citing anonymous criminal justice sources, reported in August that the FBI was investigating charitable donations by Muslim students and organizations at the University of Idaho and at Washington State University, eight miles away, for possible links to international terrorism. The Seattle paper said at the time that the inquiry is an integral part of efforts to understand a labyrinthine financial network that the Justice Department believes funded the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Al-Hussayen was mentioned in the August story as president of the university's Muslim Student Association and a doctoral student from Saudi Arabia. The P-I said, however, that he declined to comment on reports of an investigation. The Saudi man is charged with supplying IANA with money from overseas sources, providing computer expertise and with failing to disclose his relationship with the group. The Justice Department said that if the connection to the group had been known at the time of his application, he would not have been issued a visa. Al-Hussayen, who was studying for an advanced degree in computer security, is married with three children and has been on campus for years, the Spokane television station said. He was taken to the Latah County Jail but is expected to be transferred to Boise where he will appear in federal court. If convicted of the charges, Al-Hussayen faces a maximum sentence of 25 years in prison on each of the visa fraud counts and five years in prison on each false statement count. Al-Hussayen has a page on the University of Idaho's website that lists his educational background. It says he earned a B.A. in computer engineering from King Saud University in 1992 and a M.A. in computer science from Ball State University in 1997. Under the heading of "My Interest in Computer Security," he wrote: "A look at the world today, will show the dependency on computers in general and the Internet specifically. In order for the Internet to keep growing and provide us with better life. It has to be secure. And I want to contribute to this goal." A June 1999 IANA document listed Al-Hussayen as a member of both the technical committee and advisory committee for a project called IANA Radionet, which aimed to broadcast Islamic programs over the Internet. Iraq laundering The Justice Department also announced in the same indictment that a U.S. charity and four people associated with it were charged with illegally sending millions of dollars to Iraq. The four were charged in Syracuse, N.Y., with violating government bans by transferring as much as $2.7 million to Iraq. A group they established called Help the Needy sought contributions, deposited the money in central New York banks and then sent it to Iraq through the Jordan Islamic Bank in Amman, the indictment charged. worldnetdaily.com