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--- Begin Message ----Caveat Lector- http://www.onlinejournal.com/Commentary/073104Mejia/073104mejia.html The FBI whistleblower and the United Arab Emirates By Mike Mejia Online Journal Contributing WriterJuly 31, 2004—So now we have the 9/11 Commission's final report, available online or at a bookstore near you. According to staff director Phillip Zelikow during an interview on NPR, this commission report was a considerable achievement because everything has been declassified. Only it hasn't. Crucial testimony from fired FBI whistleblower Sibel Edmonds wasn't even discussed in the final report, except for one small footnote about the lack of translators in the investigative agency. John Ashcroft's Justice Department has made classified just about every statement Sibel Edmonds has made, even those that are publicly available on the Internet. In response, Ms. Edmonds, who first made charges of corruption and incompetence at the FBI translation program in early 2002, has been making increasingly vehement accusations about even greater issues than she first discussed on CBS' "60 Minutes." On that program, Edmonds spoke of a foreign criminal organization that had penetrated the FBI translator program allegedly through a colleague of hers, Jan Dickerson, whom she alleged had deliberately mistranslated documents. In that particular interview, Edmonds gave no hint that the case of Jan Dickerson or the organization she represented was in any way tied back to international terrorism. However, her recent statements in the alternative and British media lead one to believe the true picture of mistranslated documents is even uglier then the one Sibel Edmonds painted to Ed Bradley nearly two years ago. Edmonds claims that a pre-9/11 investigation that was being conducted in the FBI Counterintelligence unit was blocked from being transferred to Counterterrrorism on request of the State Department. The reason given by State: to protect 'certain foreign relations.' Ms. Edmonds has said this 'semi-legit' organization under investigation by Counterintelligence was primarily engaged in profit-making criminal activities such as money laundering, narcotics and arms trafficking, but that it was also involved somehow in terrorist support activities and that the blocking of the investigation may have impeded the FBI from uncovering crucial warnings about terror attacks. According to Edmonds, the 'semi legit' organization is still in operation and some of its members were allowed to leave the country months after 9/11. Finally, and maybe most damning of all, she has implied there exists financial ties between the organization and highly placed elected officials in the United States. Investigative reporter John Stanton recently wrote a piece on Ms. Edmonds that focused on the possible role of Turkey with this shadowy organization. Turkey is a natural country to focus on, given that Ms Edmonds was primarily a Turkish translator for the FBI. But in a July 23 interview on Amy Goodman's "Democracy Now," Edmonds hinted at another country that could be the center of the firestorm: the United Arab Emirates. Most informed Americans know the United Arab Emirates is the country from which money was wired to the alleged 9/11 hijackers. But there are other suspect activities centered in UAE that, while not directly involved in 9/11 itself, may give us a potential clue about the type of issues Ms. Edmonds is trying to lead us to. The United Arab Emirates reputedly is one of the money laundering centers of the Middle East. The infamous BCCI was majority-owned by the ruling family of Abu Dhabi. And the very lax banking laws that make various criminal enterprises easy in the UAE continue, despite US efforts to crack down . It is also, according to the CIA World Factbook, "a drug transshipment point for traffickers given its proximity to southwest Asian drug producing countries" But by far the most enticing information I found about the UAE during a Google search relates to a notorious arms trafficker named Victor Bout. Bout, a native Tajik who is reputed to be a former KGB officer, has been dubbed by Peter Hain, a senior British official, the "Merchant of Death" for his arms sales to governments and rebel organizations around the world. Some of the conflicts which he has helped fuel with his arms sales include Liberia, the Congo, Sierra Leone. And he has conducted most of his gun running from several supposedly legitimate air cargo companies based in the UAE, including Air Cess. The running of weapons to fuel conflicts in West Africa may seem horrifying but not terribly relevant to Ms. Edmonds charges. However the L.A. Times reported on January 20, 2002 "American authorities are also investigating reports surfacing since Sept. 11 that Bout did business with al Qaeda. In October, they were approached by a Bout operative who volunteered information about the smuggler's business ties to al Qaeda." According to some sources, not only is Mr. Bout alleged to have shipped weapons to al Qaeda, but it is suspected that he also helped the terrorist organization and the Taliban launder money. Furthermore, an article by the Center for Public Integrity describes Richard Ammar Chichakli, financial manager for several of Bout's companies, as "a family friend of the bin Ladens who hung out with a youthful Osama and ran a free-trade zone in the United Arab Emirates." One would think an outlaw arms merchant that is suspected of transporting weapons and laundering money for al Qaeda would be immediately a target of international inquiry by the United States government, no questions asked. But further investigation leads to a quite stunning assertion. According to journalist Douglas Farah "The U.S. and Britain initially worked to keep Bout off the UN sanctions list, but backed down in the face of adverse publicity . . . A similar executive order has been at the White House, awaiting President [sic] Bush's signature, for several months . . . there has been a lot of foot dragging and the EO remains unsigned." Why would the U.S. stall in bringing to justice an illegal arms trafficking network that could provide terrorists with lethal weapons? Aren't we engaged in an all out "war on terrorism?" As it turns out, in addition to providing ammunition to America's enemies, Mr. Bout is alleged to provide the same support to many of our friends. Most recently Bout is alleged to have supported the U.S. military campaign in Iraq. And before he supplied the Taliban, he also supposedly armed the Northern Alliance. I have no idea if the case of Victor Bout has anything to do with the "semi legit" criminal organization to which Ms. Edmonds often refers. But based on all the information above presented, one can easily indulge in a little runaway speculation. Suppose the operation above described was really part of a larger transnational criminal network that includes in its trade money laundering and narcotics trafficking. Then suppose this criminal network is protected by the U.S. State Department because it advances U.S. policy goals by allowing arms to be covertly funneled to our allies where such is prohibited by U.S. or international law. Finally, let's postulate the U.S. government tolerates this criminal organization's dealings with anti-U.S. terrorists because it conducts a cold-blooded cost-benefit analysis that shows the foreign policy benefits gained outweigh the terrorist "blowback" If the public knew about the suppression of an investigation of an arms trafficker supplying Osama Bin Laden, it would not look good. The government would do anything in its power to make sure this operation was never part of the history of terror attacks against the U.S. Assuming my speculation has some element of truth, how would Sibel Edmonds' hints of financial ties between the semi-legitimate organization and certain politicians fit in the picture? In that regard, I found an enticing, if inconclusive piece of information. Victor Bout's colleague, Chichakli, is the agent for several companies registered in the state of Texas. The views expressed herein are the writers' own and do not necessarily reflect those of Online Journal. 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