"ALL CAPS IN DEFENSE OF LIBERTY IS NO VICE."

Wednesday, February 09, 2005

WAS THE U.N. WEATHER SCAM FINANCING AL QAEDA?

From the brilliant JUDITH MILLER of the NYTIMES:

The tempest inside the World Meteorological Organization began with a single check. An accountant working late one night in July 2003 at the United Nations-affiliated weather agency in Geneva spotted a check that he had signed, but noticed that someone had endorsed it to an unknown third party, one L. Khalil. The accountant's curiosity was piqued, and he began nosing around. "Within half an hour I had found about 25 checks worth about $400,000 that had not gone to where they were supposed to go," said the accountant, Luckson Ngwira. That led to a formal audit and a continuing criminal investigation by Swiss authorities at the sleepy agency, focusing on allegations of embezzlement of training funds by Muhammad Hassan, a Sudanese employee who controlled that money. Investigators allege in documents and interviews that Mr. Hassan stole as much as $3 million over three or four years.

Was it simply grand theft and fraud - (sadly so typical of the immoral bureaucrats of the UN), OR WAS IT A SCHEME TO FINANCE NEOJIHADIST TERROR? After all, Sudan is a hotbed of neojhihadism and genocide, and the perp was a Sudanese Muslim. This possible connection MUST be investigated.

It's a great short article (but one that fails to even ask this question); RTWT.

No comments: