January 26, 2009 -- Former "Al Qaeda" member poised to spill beans on Balkans operation...
In what could prove to be the biggest break in the investigation of past U.S. intelligence and neo-conservative ties to Osama Bin Laden and his "Al Qaeda" operation, a Bahraini national who has been held in a detention center in Bosnia-Herzegovina, is poised to blow the whistle on past U.S. military and financial links to the activities of Osama Bin Laden and his band of Islamist guerrillas during the Balkans civil wars of the 1990s.
Ali Hamid, who was an Al Qaeda officer in Bosnia, has been held since December 2008 in a detention center in eastern Sarajevo, in what constitutes the Bosnian Serb republic. Hamid was transferred to the detention center after serving as 12-year prison sentence in Bosnia for planning a car bombing in western Mostar, in which 43 people were injured, three seriously. Hamid's Al Qaeda name is "Abu Ubayda."
Hamid wants to be transferred to Serbia and testify about crimes committed by U.S.- and Bin Laden-backed Bosnian Muslims against Serbians and Croatians during the 1990s civil war in Bosnia.
Bosnia has ordered the deportation of Hamid and his information as gained the interest of both Serbian and Bosnian authorities. The ex-Al Qaeda "El Mujahedin" commander has been visited by the Serbian consul in Sarajevo. Hamid was a key witness in The Hague at the trial of General Rasim Delic, a Bosnian Muslim commander accused of war crimes.
Hamid may be a key source of information on U.S. support for his network in the 1990s, On July 5, 2007, we reported: it has previously reported that during the Bosnia War in the 1990s, the United States provided hundreds of millions of dollars in assistance to the Bosnians that was collected from various Arab and Muslim countries, including the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Malaysia, Qatar, Egypt, and others. The collection of most of the money was done via the Bosnia Federation Defense Fund, also known as the "Bosnia Defense Fund," which was run by Richard Perle, Douglas Feith, Feith's law firm -- Feith and Zell (FANZ) -- Riggs Bank (a principal for which was Jonathan Bush, uncle of George W. Bush), and the Central Bank of Bosnia-Herzegovina (BiH) in Sarajevo. Feith's former law partner, Jerusalem-based Marc Zell, is now partnered in a Baghdad law firm with Salem Chalabi, the nephew of Ahmad Chalabi. We learned from a CIA source involved with the Bosnia Defense Fund that the agency was concerned that money transferred by Riggs, the major bank serving Saudi ambassador to the U.S. Prince Bandar and his wife Princess Haifa, to the fund's account at the Central Bank in Sarajevo was "bleeding" to terrorist elements believed to be linked to Osama bin Laden and "Al Qaeda."
When the CIA source complained about Bosnia Defense Fund cash falling into the hands of Islamic terrorists, including people linked to bin Laden, he was told by one of the major Bosnia Defense Fund principals to "just make it fucking happen!" The Bosnia link to "Al Qaeda" was important. In fact, bin Laden had reportedly not only visited Bosnia, but carried at least one Bosnian diplomatic passport and had interfaced with Bosnian diplomats in Vienna, Austria. We have learned of a money pipeline between bin Laden and Bosnia that existed since 1993, during a time when French intelligence documents reported that bin Laden and his forces in Darunta, Afghanistan were still under the operational control of the CIA and British intelligence. The financial pipeline between bin Laden and Bosnia included the Third World Relief Agency; an Egyptian-born Saudi businessman named Yasin Kadi (who was once based in Chicago); a Tunisian-born Bosnian named Chafik Ayadi bin Muhammad, who headed Kadi's operations in Zagreb, Croatia; the Sarajevo Deposit Bank of Kadi and Ayadi; and the First Austrian Bank. The Third World Relief Agency connection also provides a link between bin Laden and the Egyptian "blind sheik," Omar Abdel Rahman, convicted for his role in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
Yasin Kadi's Chicago link is important. During the time of the Bosnia Defense Fund's money flow to Sarajevo, a deal approved by the Clinton White House and the CIA, the current Democratic House Caucus Chairman and Chicago-based congressman Rahm Emanuel served as Assistant to the President for Political Affairs and Senior Advisor to the President for Policy and Strategy. Emanuel was closely involved with Clinton's foreign policy initiatives in Bosnia and Kosovo and he claims Clinton went to both places to deal with Al Qaeda training. It now appears that Emanuel was telling part of the truth -- the Clinton administration was, in fact, supporting Al Qaeda training in Bosnia and Kosovo. In addition to Perle and Feith being involved with providing money to Bosnian Muslims, with the support of Rahm Emanuel, we also point out credible Serbian reports that fugitive American financier Marc Rich, pardoned by Bill Clinton, was involved in busting international sanctions by smuggling weapons to Bosnian Muslims. Rich's attorney was I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, who was recently spared a jail term by George W. Bush and Dick Cheney.
During the fighting in Bosnia, NATO forces picked up a number of foreign Muslim irregulars. Two of those detained by Norwegian NATO forces later surfaced as Saudi hijackers of the U.S. aircraft on 9/11. There is also intelligence that Egyptian lead hijacker Mohammed Atta worked for U.S.-supported Muslim forces during the Bosnian civil war. Kadi had used Chicago as a base to launder money to various groups affiliated to bin Laden's operations, including a deal involving a DuPage County real estate operation. After leaving the White House in 1999, Emanuel, possessing only a B.A. in Political Science, became a Chicago investment banker for Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein and earned some $20 million . . .
Ironically, Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein is part of Allianz AG, the firm that helped bankroll the Nazis in Germany in the early 1930s along with Brown Brothers Harriman, for whom George W. Bush's grandfather, Prescott, was a principal. Prescott also partnered in deals with German industrialist Fritz Thyssen, a major supporter of Adolf Hitler.
Serbian officials would be wise to offer full 24x7 security protection to Hamid. There are several organizations that would stop at nothing to prevent him from talking about what he knows about U.S. and neocon support for Bin Laden and Al Qaeda in the Balkans.
