U.S. requests paring down of U.N. sanctions list

UNITED NATIONS -- The United States asked Thursday that six individuals and organizations be removed from a U.N. sanctions list, after they were cleared of suspected links to the al-Qaida terror network, U.S. officials said.

The Security Council in January issued a directive to all nations to freeze the funds of people with alleged ties to the Taliban, Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida. It also imposed a travel ban and an arms embargo.

The vast majority of the 260 organizations and individuals on the list were put there by the United States, and Washington has been criticized for not explaining its criteria or including an appeals procedure.

"We have submitted a proposal that a number of entities and individuals be delisted," U.S. Ambassador John Negroponte said. "I sent a letter to the (sanctions) committee today."

Asked if these cases give him qualms about the virtue of putting people on a list, he said: "We are acting here under very challenging circumstances. I don't have any qualms."

The U.S. government asked that three men and three companies be taken off the list, said Jimmy Gurule, the U.S. Treasury Department's undersecretary for enforcement.

The men are: Somali-born Swedes Abdi Abdulaziz Ali and Abdirisak Aden, who are officials with Al-Barakaat money exchange company, and Garad Jama, who owns the Aaran Money Wire Service Inc. of Minneapolis. Jama, 28, of Minneapolis, is a naturalized U.S. citizen.

"I welcome that the United States now is ready to take this initiative to have the two Swedes crossed off the U.N.'s sanctions list, and I presuppose that the U.N. sanctions committee will take the same line," Swedish Foreign Minister Anna Lindh Lindh said.

Gurule said the United States also requested that Aaran Money Wire Service Inc. and Global Services International U.S.A., both based in Minneapolis, and Barakaat Enterprise U.S.A. in Columbus, Ohio, be taken off the list.

He said the men were removed from the list because they signed pledges saying that "they have severed and disassociated themselves in every conceivable way from the Al-Barakaat-related businesses."

Gurule said the individuals, specifically the Somali Swedes, came forward claiming that they had no knowledge that the entities they were associated with were linked to terror.

Gurule said they were "unwitting" participants, but stressed that Al-Barakaat is "a major financial network that has supported Osama bin Laden."

A third Swedish suspect, Yusaf Ahmed Ali, signed the agreement later, but U.S. authorities are still reviewing his case, his lawyer Leif Silbersky said.

The suspects have denied any connection to terrorist organizations.

"I have been through a very bitter and difficult time," Aden told the Swedish news agency TT. "We have been able to cope through the generosity and the democratic awareness of the Swedish people."

Aden, who plans to run for parliament in Sept. 15 elections, has earlier said his family was living on his wife's student grants and money donated from a private fund.

Swedish financial authorities acting in compliance with U.N. sanctions last fall froze $130,000, including the three men's personal assets.