Search for Bin Laden links looks SOUTH

By Martin Arostegui

BOGOTA,Colombia, Oct 12, 2001 (United Press International via COMTEX) -- Law enforcement efforts aimed at cracking the international terrorist network of Osama Bin Laden are focusing on what they say is an extensive support structure for Islamic extremist groups south of the U.S. border.

Connections between al Qaida militants and Colombian guerrillas, forged documents traced to Brazil and Argentina and money laundering operations stretching from Peru to the Caribbean are among leads being investigated by the FBI in connection with the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States.

Bin Laden, a Saudi exile sheltered by Muslim extremists in Afghanistan, is the U.S. government's prime suspect in the attacks. According to Colombian police reports shared with U.S.intelligence agencies, an Islamic militant connected to the 1997 Luxor massacre of 80 western tourists in Egypt entered Colombia in 1998 on a forged passport obtained through local contacts. Identified as a member of the terrorist organization Al Gama Al-Islamya, Mohamed Enid Abdel Aai was arrested and deported to Ecuador as he attempted to reach FARC guerrilla bases, Colombianpolice sources say.

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known by its Spanish initials FARC, is the military wing of the Columbian Communist party and the country's largest rebel group. It has recently won several concessions, including a 'safe haven' zone, via peace negotiations with the Colombian government despite its ties tobombings, murder, kidnapping and drug trafficking. "It was similar to the recent case of three IRA terrorists caught operating with FARC," said Colombia's police chief at the time, Gen. Jose Serrano. According to Serrano, up to 100 members of radical Islamic groups with connections to Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan have operated in Colombia and other South American countries over recent years in league with local criminal and terrorist organizations.

Following the September 11 attacks, Colombian police revealed radio intercepts in which FARC leader Mono Jojoy calls for attacks against targets in the United States. Another Egyptian terrorist accused of participating in the Luxor massacre, Hassan Ali Mohammed Mokhles was arrested in 1999 as he crossed into Uruguay from Brazil. He was accused of forging passports and of fund raising for radical Islamic causes. According to Brazil's State Intelligence Secretariat, or SIDE, Mohkles had undergone military and intelligence training in Afghanistan.

Just hours after last month's hijacked plane crashes against the New York World Trade Center and the Pentagon in Washington, the FBI requested South American security services to intensify efforts to locate Mohkles' wife, Sahar Mohammed Hassan Abud Hamanra, according to the Bogota weekly magazine, Cambio. Law enforcement sources quoted in the report say she could be the contact between al Qaida and a 13,000-strong Arab community spread between a triangle of cities straddling the borders of Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay; Ciudad del Este, Foz de Iguacu and Puerto Iguazu. The FBI reportedly traced several telephone calls between the United States and at least one of those cities immediately following theterrorist onslaught.

U.S. law enforcement agencies fear that members of bin Laden's network could be obtaining false Argentine documentation in the area in order to enter the United States without acquiring visas, according to sources in the SIDE. The intelligence agency had already reported the arrest of one Arab on smuggling charges two months prior to the September attacks who talked about impending terrorist operations in the United States.

International law enforcement agencies report that radical Islamic activity in Latin America is closely connected to drugtrafficking and arms dealing in the area. Indeed, Colombian police sources warn that dozens of Afghans using false Pakistani passports have been involved in developing illegal poppy cultivations to make heroin. "Poppy growths recently uncovered in Colombia areplanted in long rows similar to the growing methods detected in Afghanistan," observed ex-police chief Serrano.

Three Iraqi nationals suspected of arms smuggling were caught entering Miami last month after spending two months in Colombia's FARC-controlled zone of San Vicente del Caguan, according to the FBI. Other Iraqis using forged travel documents were simultaneously arrested in Chile. Last year authorities in the Cayman Islands detained three Afghans using false Pakistani passports as they tried to deposit $2 milliondollars in suspected drug money at a local bank. The individuals identified as native Afghans by British police investigators had entered on a commercial flight from Cuba. According to British government sources, the three are still in custody.

To add yet another thread to al Qaida's complex web ofr elationships in South America, Peru's jailed former spy chief, Vladimiro Montesinos, said in January 2000 that bin Laden was acquiring homes and apartments in Peru to serve as rest areas for members of his network. Among secretly recorded conversations which led to his imprisonment on massive moneylaundering and bribery charges, Montesinos tells the mayor of the Peruvian port of Callao that "bin Laden's center of importance in Latin America is herein Lima," Peru's capital. The Saudi exile set up the center "not to carry outoperations in Lima," Montesinos explained, "but to act against Americans in Argentina, Brazil, Chile and the rest of Latin America." The subject of bin Laden came up as Montesinos discussed airport security.

Bin Laden could also be drawing support from leftistanti-American regimes in Venezuela and Cuba, both of whose presidents, Hugo Chavez and Fidel Castro, toured radical Islamic states earlier this year. For example, speaking to acrowd of cheering Muslim fundamentalists in Iran last May, Castro said, "together we will bring America to its knees."

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