Italy holds al-Qaeda arms trade suspect

The Times (U.K.) ^ | Daniel McGrory

[Pokey78]

A MILLIONAIRE diamond-smuggler closely linked to a notorious arms dealer was arrested in Italy at the weekend on suspicion of supplying weapons to al-Qaeda.

Sanjivan Ruprah, who is Kenyan-born, was picked up near Milan, which investigators say is al-Qaeda’s main European headquarters.

He was said to be travelling on a fake Belgian passport with an unnamed woman, believed to be his sister, who was using British documents.

Mr Ruprah’s name features prominently on a United Nations list of those banned from international flights because of links to arms and diamond-trafficking in Africa, as is his close associate, the Russian businessman Victor Bout. British and US Intelligence allege that Mr Bout was the main arms supplier to the Taleban.

Mr Ruprah was on the run after fleeing bail in Belgium, and the Italian police said: “We all know about this man, who is an international arms-trafficker.” Detectives say that they found incriminating documents during their search.

[SJackson]

Did you know Lev Leviev is listed along with Marc Rich and Gary Winnick as major supporters of "Birthright Israel?"


OH MY G-D!!!!!!!!

They donated to Hillel? I’m shocked.

I know you hate Jews, but do you intend to attempt to portray Hillel as part of a criminal conspiracy? You sink to new lows.

.................

AM, if I want to start a thread about Mafioso who have contributed to Catholic charities or the Catholic Church, may I? This seem to be a area of interest on FR. What topic do I put it under.

[LarryLied]

Gaydamak, a wanted criminal, bought 15% of Lev Leviev's company "Africa Israel'. That is a fact. Gaydamak is wanted for illegally smuggling hundreds of millions of dollars worth of arms into Angola. That is a fact. Lev Leviev was awarded a monopoly on Angolan diamonds. Another fact. Gaydamak opened bank accounts for the man accussed of fixing the Olympics. Another fact. Gaydamak routed his weapons deals through a company owned by Marc Rich. That too is a fact.

No one on any of these threads has disputed any of these facts. Or tried to find more. That speaks for itself.

[LarryLied]

I would not boast of Marc Rich and Gary Winnick being donors to any charity I was involved with. I would want my name off the list. Apparently Lev Leviev doesn't have a problem with it.

[SJackson]

That's because you're a bigot.

[Shermy]

March 7, 2002 UPI Story
___________
"Antwerp and dirty diamond rumors"

In his office high above this city's bustling diamond sector, Mark Van Bockstael offered a lesson of sorts on African geography.

"These," said Van Bockstael, "are the good guys." With a pointer, the international affairs director of Belgium's Diamond High Council tapped a giant map of the Democratic Republic of Congo hanging on the wall of his office, which overlooks the city's bustling diamond district. Sprinkled across the vast relief were small pins indicating diamond mines controlled by the government of Congolese President Joseph Kabila.

"And these," he continued, pointing to another set of pins indicating rebel-held diamond mines, "are the bad guys. "But in the Congo, because of the political balances, nobody wants to say these are the good guys, and these are the bad guys," Van Bockstael told United Press International. "And the problem for us is -- how, on the trade floor, are we going to do anything about it?"

Defining legal or illicit diamonds is only one of many problems besetting Antwerp's venerable diamond industry, where 80 percent of the world's rough diamonds are bought and sold.

Stung two years ago by a United Nations report criticizing lax Belgian diamond regulations, the government imposed some of the world's strictest import rules. But new allegations suggest rough diamonds from conflict-torn countries like Congo are still being traded illegally in Antwerp, enriching not only tribal warlords, but Middle Eastern terrorists as well.

Reports in The Washington Post late last year claimed Hezbollah and al Qaida terrorist networks reaped millions of dollars from illicit diamonds mined by rebels in Sierra Leone and Congo, with the best stones smuggled into Antwerp. Not only did two Antwerp diamond dealers facilitate the trade, the newspaper said citing intelligence sources, but the city was transforming into a financial headquarters for radical Islamic groups.

If true, the accounts pose new challenges for Europe's fight against terrorism. But Belgian officials are reluctant to admit that illicit diamond dollars could be bankrolling local terrorist networks.

"From the very start, the Belgians have been careful not to make assumptions about the motivation and purpose in the arrests they've made," said one American diplomat. "But the information that's been pieced together suggests that there is a connection."

The tangled ties between diamonds and terrorism also raise questions about the effectiveness of Belgian diamond regulations, and an ambitious international plan to control trafficking of conflict diamonds. Known as the Kimberly Process, the new international system aims to be up and running by the year's end.

"The Belgium government has successfully managed to give the impression they are concentrating and cracking down on illicit diamonds," said Alex Yearsley, a campaigner against conflict diamonds for Global Witness, a London-based advocacy group. "But from all the information we get from diamond dealers, it's business as usual in Antwerp."

In interviews with UPI, government officials and diamond dealers said they were stunned by the Post's reports and argued the amount of illicit diamonds entering Antwerp had dropped significantly in the past two years.

Nonetheless, the allegations recently prompted an Antwerp court to launch a judicial investigation. A former U.S. ambassador to Sierra Leone, Joe Melrose, also visited Antwerp in December, to speak with diamond dealers and experts.

"Do we have terrorists as diamond people in Antwerp? I'm pretty confident that we don't," said Van Bockstael of the diamond council, which co-regulates the industry with the Belgian government. "Is it possible that somebody has, as a client, a terrorist network? That's a totally different question."

In the closed and secretive world of Antwerp's diamond industry, where Lebanese Muslims, Hassidic Jews, Israelis and Indians collaborate and compete, an answer is hard to find.

But Christian Dietrich, an African diamond analyst at Antwerp's International Peace Information Service, recently traced almost a dozen local companies with direct or indirect ties to one of the diamond dealers in the investigation, Aziz Nassour, who now lives in Lebanon.

"I think it's quite common there's money laundered through the diamond trade," said Dietrich, who nonetheless remains skeptical about alleged local terrorist links. "But it's not just here. It's South Africa, and Israel, and a lot of other places."

In a separate incident last month, Belgian police arrested another alleged diamond middleman, Sanjivan Ruprah, outside Brussels. According to French and Belgian news reports, Ruprah worked closely with Victor Bout, a Russian suspected of supplying the Taliban and Al Qaida with weapons.

French and Belgium newspapers have reported that Ruprah was allowed to remain free for months in exchange for providing the CIA and other U.S. authorities with information on alleged arms deals with al Qaida and the Taliban.

But Johan Peleman, a Belgian weapons and diamonds expert suggests Ruprah may have been delivering bogus information.

"I met Ruprah almost weekly in the last few months," Peleman said in a telephone interview. "And since early October, he traveled to Washington at least three times. He was milking me on al Qaida, and connections to Africa, and feeding that to the Americans."

For their part, diamond merchants and government officials argue Belgium alone cannot regulate illegal diamond sales made in dirt-poor African countries, where customs agents are corruptible, and the lines of legality are blurred at best.

The United Nations, for example, has banned trade in conflict diamonds -- those enriching certain African rebel groups -- mined in Angola and Sierra Leone, and demanded special certificates for all others. But no such ban, or certification system, currently exists for diamonds mined in Congo, which have helped fuel more than three years of civil war.

"There is an ethics problem and a business problem" when it comes to Congo, said diamond dealer Samy Doppelt, whose company, S. Langer Diamonds, does business with the Congolese government. "Should you work in rebel territory? That's an ethics problem. But when it comes to business, it's totally legal."

At a July 2000 meeting in Antwerp, the world's major diamond organizations issued a joint resolution vowing to crack down on the conflict-diamond trade. The city's top diamond banks warned customers they would sever relations with anyone dealing in conflict diamonds.

Brussels also earned kudos for issuing import statistics, and working with several African governments to put controls in place.

But critics claim Belgium's own regulations are not always enforced, and customs agents screen flights from Africa with a casual eye.

"You can basically lie and say the diamonds are from the Caribbean," said Dietrich, who travels to Africa regularly. "Even though there wasn't a flight that day from the Caribbean."

Governments and private groups hope international regulations under the Kimberly Process will root out most conflict diamonds from the market. The new rules would require certificates for all legal diamonds, and procedures to trace their journey from mines to trading hubs like Antwerp.

Even so, Antwerp dealers like Gregg Hupert argue terrorists and ordinary crooks will merely switch their sights to other lucrative raw materials, such as exotic timber and coltan, a metallic ore that ends up in most laptops, mobile phones and other electronic devices.

"People don't fight because of diamonds. They fight for power," said Hupert, managing director of Independent Diamond Valuators and who has worked in Africa for years. "Everybody wants to come down on the diamond business. They think this is going to be the quick fix. Wrong."

[Shermy]

BTW, just because some people are in the same "business", it doens't mean they're connected. McDonald's may be in the same business, for example.

Article above mentions Belgium, but I think the big laundering place for Qaida jewels is Switzerland, as you showed in a previous post.

This guy Sanjivan may not even be "muslim", and could be a gun runner little related at all to Islamist terrorism. The caught in "Milan" angle may not be much of one at all, just a circumstance.

[Shermy]

Meant Larry.

[iav2]

You play the guilt by association game to further your agenda. There are a fair number of priests who have molested kids in the current incarnation of the Church. Is the Church guilty of sex abuse, when, most of the priests until recently were just shfited to area?? Yes or no answer will do.

Also, if I had a website I would not allow you to post there. You post lies and innuendo. But I am forced to share this place with the likes of you. In spite of that, I am not guilty of the sort of innuendo and game playing you are, just because you post at the same site.

[SJackson]

Also, if I had a website I would not allow you to post there. You post lies and innuendo. But I am forced to share this place with the likes of you. In spite of that, I am not guilty of the sort of innuendo and game playing you are, just because you post at the same site.

You mean Hillel isn't a criminal organization? You'd be associated with it? Me too.

Larry does bring the place down into the sludge, doesn't he.

[iav2]

And he's annoyed that nobody wants to join him in his skewed research binge. Not the American media or other posters here. Hehehe.

[Alouette]

Gaydamak is wanted for illegally smuggling hundreds of millions of dollars worth of arms into Angola. That is a fact. Lev Leviev was awarded a monopoly on Angolan diamonds. Another fact. Gaydamak opened bank accounts for the man accussed of fixing the Olympics. Another fact. Gaydamak routed his weapons deals through a company owned by Marc Rich. That too is a fact.

Gee, Lev Leviev donated to the same charity as Marc Rich and Gary Winnick (and about a million other people)! The way you are dropping names like confetti, to imply "guilt by association" it is only a matter of time before you will make libels against Alouette's immediate family member who is Mr. Leviev's close friend and associate. It's one thing to make unfounded accusations against people who are far away, but it is quite another to slander someone to his face, or much worse, to his mother's face. Are you sure you want to go there?

[veronica]

Check this out:

Pulitzer Prize Winners Teach Hillel Students

"More than 30 Jewish student journalists from across the United States studied with Pulitzer Prize-winners Charles Krauthammer and Glenn Frankel, the editor of The Washington Post Magazine, as well as editors of leading American Jewish publications as part of the Journalism Track of the 2001 Charlotte and Jack J. Spitzer B'nai B'rith Hillel Forum on Public Policy.

The young people, from a variety of schools across the United States, confronted some of the toughest ethical dilemmas of their profession: Can journalists put aside their Jewish identity when covering a news story, especially one that reflects poorly on the Jewish community? How do reporters reconcile Judaism's prohibition of gossip with the demands of their work?"

Well I guess Charles Krauthammer, Conservative writer and icon, is "one of them" too.

I wonder if he ever did a column on the Olympics. ;)

[LarryLied]

I think the big laundering place for Qaida jewels is Switzerland

Most likely. The Swiss "officially" export almost no diamond rough. But they have a free trade zone where diamonds can move from country to country without being tracked. In other words, a laundry. Israel, Belgium and the UK buy much of their rough from Switzerland.

[Libertarianize the GOP]

bump

[Rodney King]

As it so happens, Mr. Leviev is a very close personal friend of someone in my immediate family. He is a very fine gentleman, and a good citizen. He is not a criminal. So it is therefore possible for me to ask him this very question. If you have some real evidence that he has committed crimes, let's hear it and I can tell him to his face. Otherwise admit that you don't know what the hell you are talking about.

Free Republic never ceases to amaze with the amount of information, knowledge, and contacts that people have. I have never bothered to study and of Larry's postings. This picqued my interst though as he has attacked someone that Alouette knows.

So Larry, what is your allegation about Lev Leviev, and what is your source?

[LarryLied]

It's one thing to make unfounded accusations against people who are far away, but it is quite another to slander someone to his face, or much worse, to his mother's face. Are you sure you want to go there?

Tell me what is unfounded and/or slanderous. The UN Security report which states Lev Leviev was in business with a person wanted for felonies?

I was unaware that so many people think it is OK to take money from a thief such as Marc Rich or to be associated with an organization he funds. That concept is alien to me.Leon Wieseltier agrees with me on this but I guess we are in a minority:

If I were a Rich man

[Alouette]

Tell me what is unfounded and/or slanderous. The UN Security report which states Lev Leviev was in business with a person wanted for felonies?

A UN report should be accepted as at face value as absolute and undeniable fact? Are you out of your mind?

Do you have evidence that Mr. Leviev is a felon? Do you have proof that he has committed a crime? Or are you just smearing him (and my family, and myself) by innuendo and "guilt by association"?

For someone who claims to so abhor the techniques of the KGB and the Stalinists, you get a lot of mileage out of their methods. In a civilized and free society, individuals are held responsible for their own crimes, not the crimes of others. Ever hear of the concept "innocent until proven guilty"?

You are requested to CEASE AND DESIST.

[LarryLied]

Gaydamak was and, according to UN reports, probably still is a business associate of Lev Leviev Have you read the UN Security Council report? Here is one excerpt:

"69. . . a whole network of Israelis was established, including Mr. Gertler in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Lev Leviev in Angola and Shmuel Shnitzer in Sierra Leone. In all three cases, the pattern is the same. Conflict diamonds are exchanged for money, weapons and military training. These diamonds are then transported to Tel Aviv by former Israeli Air Force pilots, whose numbers have significantly increased both in UNITA-held territory in Angola and in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. In Israel, these diamonds are then cut and sold at the Ramat Gan Diamond Centre."

http://www.congojeunesse.com/report3.html

If you distrust that website, mix and match a search on: Lev Leviev, Russia, Gaidamak, Gaydamak, diamonds, weapons, Falcone,Angola, Africa Israel,ASCorp,blood diamonds. You will find the report elsewhere (usually as a PDF or DOC download). Lots of other information out there on the connections between Gaydamak and Leviev.

mafree...the UN report above suggests low level warfare in Africa maintained solely because it is in the economic interest of some very powerful and rich outsiders to have conflict.

Btw...DeBeers is involved in coltan. Checking to see if Leviev is too. Only three companies in the world process it. The one in the USA won't handle "blood coltan' but the one in Marc Rich's favor place, the former Soviet Union, does.

[Alouette]

So, no solid evidence other than insinuation and innuendo. This from the man who claims to despise communists and all they stand for. This is your second notice to CEASE AND DESIST.