TIMES ONLINE: Millions of dollars of Saudi Arabian money have flowed into Afghanistan over the past four years, the country’s intelligence officials say, with the sponsorship of terrorism its most likely use.
According to members of the Afghan financial intelligence unit, FinTraca, the funds, totalling more than £920 million, enter from Pakistan, where they are converted into rupees or dollars, the favoured currency for terrorist operations.
“We can trace it back as far as an entry point in Waziristan,” said Mohammed Mustafa Massoudi, the director-general of FinTraca in Kabul. “Why would anyone want to put such money into Waziristan? Only one reason — terrorism.”
The revelations illuminate the difficulties in dividing the Taleban from al-Qaeda influence and the continuing involvement of Saudi donors in sponsoring the insurgency. >>> Anthony Loyd, Kabul | Monday, May 31, 2010
Star comment:
Oil revenues have allowed the Saudis to spread Wahabbism, the fanatical, destructive form of Islam all over the Muslim world and among the Muslims in the West. One of the Five Pillars of Islam established in the Koran requires that all Muslims give 2.5% of their income to charity. These donations are known as zakat.The amount of zakat donated in Saudi Arabia has been estimated to be around $10 billion annually. Predictably, the Wahhabis have now co-opted this mainstream institution within Islam to promote jihadism.The Saudi government funds mosques, university chairs, Islamic study centres, and religious schools known as madrassas all over the world. The Saudi education system has played a central role in indoctrinating an entire generation of young men into a rabidly xenophobic ideology. – © Alec Paterson | [Source: Times Online Comments] | Monday, May 31, 2010
