Volume 5 • Number 4 • September 2007

“We know that the nation requires more from our Intelligence Community than ever before because
America confronts a greater diversity of threats and challenges than ever before. Globalization…does
facilitate the terrorist threat, heightens the danger of WMD proliferation, and contributes to regional
instability and reconfigurations of power and influence.”
The Honorable John D. Negroponte, Former Director of National Intelligence,
Statement for the Record to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, January 11, 2007

CONTENTS North-West Frontier Province, and Islamabad to em-

Terrorism................................................... 1
Money Laundering.................................... 3
Drug Trafficking ........................................ 3
Arms Trafficking ....................................... 4
Cyber Crime .............................................. 5
Maritime Security...................................... 5
Organized Crime ....................................... 5
Nuclear Threat........................................... 6
TERRORISM
Pakistani Authorities on the Lookout for Burqa-
Clad Suicide Bombers
During the last week of September, Pakistani intelli-
gence services released reports warning against sui-
cide attacks carried out by burqa-clad bombers. The
reports advised senior law enforcement officials to
issue instructions for increased scrutiny of suspicious
women and youths roaming near key installations,
law enforcement personnel, and important public and
commercial buildings. Former male and female stu-
dents of Jamia Hafsa and Lal Masjid, two neighbor-
ing madrasahs shut down by the Pakistani govern-
ment during Operation Silence, were singled out as
potential attackers.
In response to these reports, the Interior Ministry dis-
seminated special letters to senior security and admin-
istrative officials. The Ministry also directed law en-
forcement officials in Punjab, Sindh, Balochistan,
ploy emergency precautionary measures. In Punjab
alone, more than 2,500 special branch personnel were
dispatched in response to the warning. Most of these
2,500 officers were undercover female operatives
working in select areas, such as madrasahs for
women.
Despite these measures, a burqa-clad suicide bomber
managed to kill 16 people on October 1 at a police
checkpoint in Bannu. Although initial reports sug-
gested that the bomber was a woman, the perpetrator
was in fact a man disguised as a woman. The bomber
was riding a motorized rickshaw and had been
stopped at the checkpoint when the bomb exploded.
(Combined dispatches)
Fatah al-Islam Leader and Militants at Large Fol-
lowing Refugee Camp Raid
Contrary to earlier reports, Lebanese officials con-
firmed that Shaker al-Absi, the leader of the jihadist
group Fatah al-Islam, remains alive. Al-Absi, who
was among the militants fighting Lebanese forces
during the bitter siege of the Nahr al-Bared refugee
camp, was reported to have fled the camp during a
mass breakout.
Mohammed Yahya Shiba, a Yemeni Fatah al-Islam
militant arrested by Lebanese troops in the Miyeh re-
gion on September 8, testified that he had seen al-
Absi leave the camp shortly before midnight on Sep-
tember 1. Although more than 50 militants were
2
killed and dozens were arrested during the mass
breakout that marked the end of the 15-week standoff,
many militants managed to escape alongside al-Absi.
Despite the collapse of its stronghold at Nahr al-
Bared, Fatah al-Islam remains a security risk. The
group is suspected by some of having links to al
Qaeda. Al-Absi personally knew the late leader of al
Qaeda in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, and was tried
in absentia alongside him for the 2002 killing of a
U.S. diplomat in Jordan. In July of 2006, Fatah al-
Islam unsuccessfully attempted an operation in
Europe when two of its suspected members planted
bombs on German commuter trains that failed to ex-
plode. (Combined dispatches)
Al Qaeda Terrorist Extradited to the United States
Oussama Abdullah Kassir, a Swedish citizen of
Lebanese descent, was extradited to New York from
the Czech Republic on the morning of September 25.
Kassir had been in Czech custody since December of
2005, when he was arrested pursuant to an Interpol
warrant. At the time of his arrest, he was on a layover
at the Prague-Ruzyne airport on the way to Beirut
from his home in Stockholm. He subsequently re-
mained in Czech custody, during which time he made
a request for political asylum. The request was ulti-
mately denied after the Prague High Court upheld a
lower court decision that the extradition was admissi-
ble. Following the ruling, the Czech Republic granted
custody of Kassir to the FBI on the condition that he
would only be detained in civilian facilities.
The allegations against Kassir were set forth in a
criminal complaint and superceding indictment re-
turned by a New York grand jury in February of
2006. The superseding indictment named Kassir as a
defendant in 12 of its 19 counts. Mustafa Kamel
Mustafa and Haroon Rashid Aswat, both of whom are
presently detained in England awaiting extradition to
the United States, were also named in the indictment.
All three men were charged for their efforts to estab-
lish a training camp at Bly, Oregon, in 1999. Kassir
was also charged with operating several jihadist Web
Sites between 2001 and 2005 on which he posted in-
structions on how to make bombs and mix poisons.
(Combined dispatches)
Spiritual Leader Warns of Danger from Fighters
Returning from Abroad
Hersi Hilole, the chairman of the Somali Council of
Australia, has warned that Australian Muslims return-
ing from combat in Somalia might be prone to carry
out terrorist activities. Fighting between Ethiopian-
backed Somali forces and the Islamic Courts Union, a
loose coalition suspected of having ties with al
Qaeda, has mobilized Somali men living in Australia
to join the conflict. While the exact number of Aus-
tralians who have traveled to fight in Somalia remains
unknown, Hilole was quoted in April as saying this
number exceeded 20.
In the same warning, Hilole also accused hard-line
Wahabi clerics in Melbourne of radicalizing young
Somali men, which in turn encourages them to travel
abroad and fight. Wahabism is popular in Somalia,
making its fundamentalist interpretation of Islam pal-
atable among young men of Somali extraction, even
those living in westernized nations such as Australia.
A striking example of this phenomenon can be seen
in Ahmed Ali, a young Somali man living in Austra-
lia who traveled to fight alongside the Islamic Courts
Union. In an interview, Ali’s mother insisted that he
worked as an interpreter with al Qaeda. She also
claimed that Sheik Mohammed Omran, a Jordanian
religious leader living in Melbourne, was entirely re-
sponsible for her son’s radicalization.
The migration of jihadists returning to their native
lands after fighting in religiously motivated conflicts
has historically led to increased terrorism. From fund-
raising and weapons procurement to the sharpening
and development of ideologies, such conflicts fully
prepare radical fighters to wage war at home. Jihadist
campaigns in Afghanistan, Chechnya, Iraq, and So-
malia have emboldened extremists and provided prac-
tical training that is otherwise unavailable. Fighters
returning from abroad also assist the wider movement
by leveraging their status as role models to bolster
recruitment among disenfranchised Muslims prone to
radicalization. (Combined dispatches)

MONEY LAUNDERING
Federal Grand Jury Indicts 39 in International
Money Laundering Scheme
According to an FBI press release, four separate
money laundering schemes involving 46 defendants
in the United States, Canada, Belgium, and Spain
were broken up this month as a result of Operation
Cash-Out. The four-year undercover operation in-
volved local and state law enforcement agencies
working in tandem with foreign agencies and led to
the indictment of 39 individuals.
Three of the four disrupted schemes eschewed tradi-
tional financial networks in favor of a monetary ex-
change system known as hawala. The United States
district attorney responsible for the case described the
hawala system as a crude form of Western Union.
Though not technically illegal, the hawala system is
more informal than traditional networks and thus is
harder for authorities to track and regulate. This in
turn opens the door for unlicensed and unreported il-
licit transactions.
For the most part, witnesses cooperating with law en-
forcement agents told the defendants that the money
they were laundering came from drug trafficking and
cigarette smuggling. One of the defendants in the
case, however, Saifullah Ranjha, was told he was
laundering money for al Qaeda. All told, the govern-
ment sought the ownership of two convenience stores
and $5,148,000 in criminal forfeitures from the de-
fendants. (Combined dispatches)
DRUG TRAFFICKING
Collective Security Treaty Organization Launches
Drug Interdiction Operation
Operation Kanal-2007, which involved 91,000 law
enforcement officers hailing from seven nations of
the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO),
has led to the seizure of over 10 metric tons of narcot-
ics, according to the Russian anti-drug agency. In ad-
dition to narcotics, CSTO operatives seized 223 met-
ric tons of drug-making chemicals and raw materials,
687 firearms, 15,000 rounds of ammunition, and more
than $1.7 million dollars worth of cash and valuables.
3
During the weeklong blitz, extra personnel were sta-
tioned along major transportation hubs such as air-
ports, border crossings, and railroad stations. In addi-
tion to CSTO law enforcement officers, observers
from Azerbaijan, the United States, China, Latvia,
Lithuania, Mongolia, Poland, Ukraine, and Finland
took part in the operation.
States of the CSTO have faced an ever-increasing in-
flux of narcotics since Afghanistan surpassed the
Golden Triangle in opium production. Thirty years
ago, the Golden Triangle produced more than 70 per-
cent of the opium sold worldwide. This figure is now
down to 5 percent due to economic pressure from
China, among other factors. This precipitous decline
created a worldwide scarcity of supply, which incen-
tivized Afghan poppy farmers to increase production.
With fertile soil that yields on average four times
more opium than crops grown in the Golden Triangle,
Afghanistan now produces about 92 percent of the
world’s opium. This explosive growth has thrust
Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan into the
front line of the CSTO’s war on drugs, necessitating
innovative anti-drug initiatives such as the Kanal op-
eration to stem the flow of Afghan heroin.
(Combined dispatches)
Cocaine Kingpin Arrested in Columbia
On September 10, an elite Columbian unit arrested
cocaine kingpin Diego Montoya, a senior leader in
the brutal Norte del Valle cartel. Montoya, arrested in
the rural town of Zarzal, was among the FBI’s top 10
most wanted fugitives and will be turned over to the
bureau following questioning by Columbian authori-
ties. During Montoya’s tenure, authorities estimate
that the Norte del Valle cartel killed about 1,500 peo-
ple and trafficked hundreds of tons of cocaine to the
United States and Europe. Montoya was one of Co-
lumbia’s largest traffickers, and his arrest will likely
cause a temporary disruption to Columbia’s cocaine
trade as competitors vie to fill the vacuum left by his
departure.
The success of the large-scale operation that led to
Montoya’s arrest was credited, in part, to a purge of
high-ranking officers in the armed forces. Many of
the purged officers, especially those in the army, were
suspected of colluding with Montoya’s cartel. His in-
filtration of the armed forces provided Montoya with
4
sensitive information that ultimately helped him and
members of his organization elude capture. Last year,
for example, the cartel purchased information that
provided the positions of U.S. and British warships
conducting drug interdiction operations in the Carib-
bean. (Combined dispatches)
ARMS TRAFFICKING
Hi-Tech Chinese Weapons Seized in Afghanistan
Britain and the United States have recently lodged
complaints to Beijing about the appearance of sophis-
ticated, newly manufactured Chinese weapons in Af-
ghanistan. Though the Chinese manufacture of the
weapons is undisputed, a foreign ministry spokesman
from Beijing insisted that China’s arms exports con-
formed to its international obligations. The weapons
in question, discovered with their serial numbers re-
moved to obfuscate their intermediate source, in-
cluded anti-aircraft guns, landmines, rocket-propelled
grenades, IED components, and even the HN-5, a
Chinese copy of the Soviet-manufactured SA-7 sur-
face-to-air guided missile.
While high-ranking U.S. officials have accused Iran
of receiving the weapons from China and smuggling
them into Afghanistan, Afghan president Hamid Kar-
zai doubts this link, citing particularly strong ties with
Iran. Others skeptical of Iran’s role in arming the
Taliban point to residual animosity from the 1998
murder of Iranian diplomats and Shi’a civilians at the
hands of the Taliban in the town of Mazar-e-Sharif.
The incident caused so much furor at the time that
Iran considered invading western Afghanistan.
Whatever the source of the weapons, given the close
operational ties between al Qaeda and the Taliban, the
latter’s possession of such arms, especially the HN-
5s, is disturbing. Terrorist groups, such as al Qaeda,
have tried several times in the past to use man-
portable missiles to target civilian and military air-
craft. The December 2002 attack on an Israeli charter
jet in Mombassa, Kenya, the June 2002 attempt on a
military jet outside Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi
Arabia, and the 2001 plan to attack an El Al jet carry-
ing Shimon Peres in the Czech Republic, though all
unsuccessful, are indicative of this threat. According
to some sources, the serial numbers on the launchers
used in all three of the failed plots were close to one
another. This raises the possibility that they might
have come from the same source. If that is the case, it
indicates the ability of terrorists groups to transport
shoulder-fired guided missile systems across borders
to Europe, Africa, and the Middle East. Given the le-
thality of these weapons, the possible know-how of
terrorists to transport them, and the close ties between
al Qaeda and the Taliban, the appearance of sophisti-
cated surface-to-air missiles in Afghanistan should be
of concern to everybody. (Combined dispatches)
Global Arms Trade: UN Members Call for Action
In the end of September, over 100 nations submitted
ideas to the United Nations for a treaty to regulate the
global exchange of arms. Britain, one of the nations
spearheading the effort, proposed a legally binding
treaty that would authorize weapons sales only after
exporting states ensured weapons would not exacer-
bate internal or external conflict, be used for terror-
ism, undermine economic development, or enable
human rights abuses. The British proposal went on to
recommend an enforcement and monitoring mecha-
nism to ensure states live up to their treaty obliga-
tions. By closing existing loopholes in the interna-
tional arms export regime, the British government
would make it more difficult for black-market arms
traders to operate.
The catalyst for this development came in December
of 2006, when 153 nations voted to begin work on the
treaty. Despite overwhelming support for the meas-
ure, 24 countries, including Russia and China, ab-
stained from the vote while 1 country, the United
States, voted against it. On October 1, the Congres-
sional Research Service released their most recent
figures on the global arms trade. According to the
figures, the United States was the largest exporter of
arms, with $17 billion in sales and accounting for
some 42 percent of the global market. Given this
overwhelming market presence, the United States’
refusal to support the nascent treaty could severely
undermine it. With annual sales of $3 billion, Britain
is still among the top five largest exporters of arms in
the world. This position makes Britain an important
voice in the movement to reform the international
arms export regime, a courageous move given the
negative impact such a stance is likely to have on its
defense industry.

According to a report released by the International
Action Network on Small Arms, 1,000,000 people are
wounded and 300,000 are killed by small arms alone
every year. Though relatively innocuous when com-
pared to the destructive power of nuclear arms, con-
ventional weapons have decimated entire regions of
the world and are the primary tools of empowerment
for unscrupulous groups such as terrorists and crimi-
nal gangs. Increased international oversight of the
global arms trade will prove an important tool in
combating a host of transnational threats.
(Combined dispatches)
CYBER CRIME
India Strengthens Campaign against Cyber Crime
Despite being at the cutting edge in software pro-
gramming and information technology, India remains
behind in creating laws and regulations governing
cyberspace. These comments, made by Vijay Shan-
ker, the director of the Indian Central Bureau of In-
vestigation (CBI), came amid a month that saw the
Indian government taking several major steps, both
unilateral and multilateral, toward addressing cyber
crime.
Domestically, India is taking a two-pronged approach
toward combating this issue. The first prong consists
of a 35 million-rupee grant to the CBI to provide
funding for cutting-edge software and specialized
training. The second prong involves a bottom-up revi-
sion of a series of laws created to regulate cyberspace
known as the IT Act 2000. The parliamentary panel
set up to review the first iteration of these revisions,
called the Draft IT Act 2006, have sharply criticized
it. Members of the panel accuse the IT Act of being a
rehash of the original act rather than new legislation
designed to comprehensibly address recent develop-
ments in cyber crime such as cyber terrorism.
Speaking in New Delhi at the inauguration of the 7th
International Conference on Cyber Crime, Interior
Minister Shivraj Patil stated that domestic efforts to
combat cyber crime would be useless unless but-
tressed by international cooperation. He cited interna-
tional exchanges of forensic technology, training, and
intelligence as examples of such cooperation that
could harmonize efforts to combat cyber crime across
borders. Ronald Noble, Interpol’s secretary general,
5
also speaking at the conference, echoed Patil’s re-
marks, stating that one of Interpol’s priorities was to
assist police forces in combating cyber crime through
the creation of a global operational network of na-
tional central reference points. (Combined dispatches)
MARITIME SECURITY
Joint Training Exercise Held in Laem Chabang
Over 50 different agencies participated in a four-day
training exercise in the Thai port of Laem Chabang.
The exercise, designed to improve the ability of Thai
authorities to react to a wide variety of events, was
inspired in part by similar exercises conducted in the
Port of Tacoma and Seattle. Officials from U.S. Im-
migration and Customs Enforcement and the Depart-
ment of Homeland Security flew to Thailand to par-
ticipate in the event. This exchange of security-related
expertise constitutes an import aspect of the Thailand-
Washington State Partnership Program.
Laem Chabang is among the largest ports in the world
and handles a sizeable percentage of Thailand’s ex-
ports. Currently, U.S. Customs and Border Protection
officers are stationed there as part of the agency’s
Container Security Initiative. This initiative, launched
in 2002, seeks to prevent terrorist groups from ex-
ploiting cargo containers to deliver weapons.
(Combined dispatches)
ORGANIZED CRIME
Czech Police Raid Organized Crime Group
Officers from the Czech Republic’s elite organized
crime unit detained 15 suspected members of the Lu-
hansk Brigade during a coordinated series of raids in
Prague, Brno, and Teplice. Though 2 of the 15 indi-
viduals originally seized were later released due to
lack of evidence, money forgery charges were
brought against the 13 remaining suspects.
The suspects, who hail from the Czech Republic, Slo-
vakia, Syria, the former Soviet Union, and the former
Yugoslavia, were thought to have circulated a quan-
tity of counterfeit $100 bills valued in the hundreds of
thousands of dollars. According to a spokesman for
the Czech police, the forgeries were of a very high
quality and were not produced in Europe. During
6
searches, police found both legal and illegal weapons,
forged identification cards from various countries,
and a large sum of cash. If convicted, the suspects
face up to 15 years in prison.
The Luhansk Brigade, a Russian-speaking organized
crime outfit named after a city in Ukraine, is known
to operate in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary,
and Spain. The group first attracted the attention of
the Czech police in 1996. Four years later, Czech po-
lice arrested seven senior members of the organiza-
tion who were counterfeiting money, blackmailing
entrepreneurs, trafficking arms, and perpetrating sev-
eral other violent crimes. A year ago, Czech police
began shadowing the group of suspected counterfeit-
ers, gathering enough evidence to carry out the most
recent arrests. (Combined dispatches)
NUCLEAR THREAT
International Atomic Energy Agency Releases
Most Recent Statistics on Illicit Trafficking
The United Nations nuclear watchdog released their
latest dataset covering unauthorized acquisition, pro-
vision, possession, use, transfer, and disposal of nu-
clear and radioactive materials. This dataset, which
covers all of 2006, lists 150 instances of such behav-
ior as well as 102 instances that were reported in 2006
but took place previously.
The dataset separates the reported incidents into three
distinct categories: (1) unauthorized possession and
illicit trafficking, (2) thefts and losses, and (3) other
unauthorized activities. Fourteen of the incidents that
occurred in 2006 fell under the first category. While
the majority of the incidents in this category involved
the possession and trafficking of relatively innocuous
radionucleotides, a few cases involved natural ura-
nium, depleted uranium, and thorium. In one case,
Georgia reported that it had seized 79.5 grams of ura-
nium enriched to 89 percent. The second category
saw the most incidents in 2006, with 85 thefts or
losses reported. Out of these 85 incidents, only 27
percent of the material in question was recovered.
The final category, unauthorized activities, included
the recovery and detection of improperly disposed-of
sources and accounted for the remaining 51 incidents.
Though this category does not involve patently crimi-
nal behavior, it does signal a control weakness that
could be exploited. (Combined dispatches)
German National Convicted for his Role in Nu-
clear Smuggling Ring
On September 4, Gerhard Wisser was convicted of
violating several counts of South Africa’s Non-
Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction Act
and Nuclear Energy Act. Wisser, the former manag-
ing director of the South African-based Krisch Engi-
neering Firm, was a key player in the illicit nuclear
smuggling network of Pakistani scientist Abdul Qad-
eer Khan. In this capacity, Wisser facilitated the ex-
port of gas-centrifuge technology to Libya. Gas cen-
trifuges are designed to convert uranium hexafluoride
gas into highly enriched uranium that can be used in a
nuclear warhead. Wisser admitted that he continued
his activities even after determining that the materials
he was exporting would likely allow Libya to con-
struct a nuclear bomb.
Wisser’s activities were discovered when the BBC
China, a German-flagged vessel, was intercepted on
its way to Tripoli carrying parts for the gas centri-
fuges. This seizure yielded a watershed of informa-
tion on A.Q. Khan’s network, leading to the arrests of
many of its participants. Additionally, revelations
from the seizure contributed to Moammars Khaddifi’s
decision to renounce his nuclear weapons program.
In a plea bargain agreement with South African au-
thorities, Wisser consented to 18 years in jail, which
is to be suspended for 5 years pending his full coop-
eration with the ongoing investigation into A.Q.
Khan’s network. Per the agreement, Wisser will also
forfeit 2.8 million euros and 6 million rand he reaped
from his illicit activities. In return for these penalties,
all charges against Krisch Engineering have been
dropped. Speaking before the IAEA at a briefing on
Wisser’s activities and subsequent prosecution, a sen-
ior South African nonproliferation official described
the matter as one of the first successful cases against
those involved in A.Q. Khan’s network.
(Combined dispatches)
This update is produced by the Transnational
Threats Project at the Center for Strategic and In-
 7
ternational Studies (CSIS) and provides monthly
news on terrorism, drug trafficking, organized
crime, money laundering, and other transnational
threats. The TNT Update draws primarily on inter-
national media sources, including the Associated
Press, ITAR-TASS, Agence France Presse,
Reuters, Xinhua News Agency, World Tribune, Af-
ghan News, and others.

CSIS does not take specific public policy posi-

tions; accordingly, all views, positions, and con-
clusions in this publication should be understood
to be solely those of the author(s).
© 2007, Center for Strategic and International
Studies.