Every time a report about another large-scale terrorist act appears on television, radio or in newspapers, many questions involuntarily arise. For example, the following questions: where did the money for its implementation come from, who financed the terrorist attack? Besides, I wonder how expensive is terrorism? How much did it cost, for example, the most ambitious of these acts - the destruction of two skyscrapers by terrorists of the International Trade Center in New York on September 11, 2001?

Most experts agree on the main source of funds for the commission of most large-scale terrorist acts of recent times: This is the money of Osama bin Laden, the millionaire terrorist No. 1.

Indeed, according to the UN Security Council's terrorism experts, the largest known international terrorist organization, Al - Qaeda, has access to bin Laden's personal fortune. In turn, the latter concentrates in its hands both the funds of charitable organizations that sympathize with terrorists, and the income received by various industrial and financial groups controlled by bin Laden, including various small and medium-sized enterprises, as well as receiving income from illegal activities, including smuggling and various crimes: robbery, misappropriation of property and drug fraud. using credit cards ¹ .

BUSINESS, CHARITY, CRIME, AND OTHER SOURCES

According to the same experts, a large portfolio of seemingly legitimate assets is maintained and managed on behalf of Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda by a number of yet-to-be-identified intermediaries and associates in North Africa, the Middle East, Europe and Asia. According to some estimates, the value of this portfolio is approximately $ 30 million, according to others-at least ten times more. This includes highly lucrative investments made in major financial centers in Africa, Latin America, and Southeast Asia. Hundreds of millions of dollars are expected to be invested in high-yield real estate in Europe and other parts of the world.

In addition, Al-Qaeda is believed to continue to receive private donations from its wealthy supporters, which are estimated at up to $ 16 million a year and have remained virtually unchanged over time. It is also believed that Al-Qaeda is engaged in extortion of money, resorting to direct threats against commercial enterprises or individuals ^.2

Islamic charities and non-profit organizations transfer a lot of funds to Al-Qaeda. Many of them are engaged in collecting "zakat" - alms, which is one of the five pillars of faith in Islam, the duty of every Muslim. These organizations raise billions of dollars annually. The bulk of this money is used for charitable purposes. However, radical groups have the opportunity to use some of the collected funds for illegal purposes, infiltrating long-standing charitable organizations. The money received in this way is spent on maintaining an extensive network of radical fundamentalist structures, schools and public organizations that are supposed to provide shelter, provide material support, and recruit and train militants.

Many al-Qaeda cells are self - sufficient to provide a significant portion of their funding-in other words, they are "self-funded". According to reports, they are engaged in both legitimate and criminal business activities. These activities, usually carried out "locally," range from drug trafficking to bank robberies, credit card fraud, and document forgery.

Often, legitimate business is combined with a secret mission of bin Laden's emissaries. Al-Qaeda member Wadi al-Haq, who was convicted in New York of bombing American embassies, was previously sent to Baku to open a charity society that served as a cover for supporting militants fighting in Chechnya. At the same time, he was engaged in the bicycle trade, and the charity organization he created provided additional conspiracy. Approximately the same scheme was used in the preparation of the bombing of the American embassy in Kenya in 1998. Legitimate business, charity, and political violence coexisted and still do.

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BANK BARRIER AND ITS GAPS

Since the tragic events of 11 September 2001, the international community has made unprecedented efforts to combat terrorism. Many States have tightened their banking regulations in order to better identify, track and block the financial transactions of possible terrorist organizations. These rules impose new requirements on banks, which are that the latter must "know their customers", check all suspicious transactions and report them. "America," said Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill, "is waging not a conventional but a financial war against these people, and is calling on the leaders of the civilized world and their financial institutions to help us find out who these people are, where their money is, and take it away from them." ³

President Bush signed a decree freezing the bank accounts of individuals and organizations associated with terrorist activities even before the start of the military retaliation operation in Afghanistan. American banks were required to stop servicing their accounts. US citizens are prohibited from maintaining business contacts with organizations and individuals that have been blacklisted.

The leading industrial Powers followed the example of the United States. The finance ministers of Great Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, the United States and Japan agreed to freeze all accounts that can be used by terrorists. They announced their intention to strengthen cooperation in order to block the use of various funds by international terrorism.

Initial successes were quite impressive. It was possible to detect and freeze assets belonging to Al-Qaeda and related individuals and organizations in the amount of approximately $ 112 million. The Al-Qaeda leadership quickly responded to these measures, and subsequently managed to freeze only about $ 10 million. According to US government officials, it has proved extremely difficult to identify the funds and resources to which al-Qaeda is associated. It has apparently withdrawn some of its disclosed assets from the financial sector and invested in untraceable valuables. The money is supposed to have been invested in gold and precious stones , which can be thrown on the market in relatively small quantities without arousing suspicion.

Since banks and other classical financial institutions are now under intense scrutiny, Al-Qaeda uses not only courier services but also an informal financial network known as "howwala" (in Hindi) when transferring funds. This method provides fast, reliable and inexpensive transfer of money and valuables around the world, is based solely on trust and leaves no trace. Its essence is that the shadow currency changer, having received cash in one locality and contacting his correspondent in another city by phone, instructs him to pay the appropriate amount to the addressee of the client.

According to experts, hundreds of millions of dollars are transferred annually to terrorist organizations in this way. The hauval mechanism has long been based on traditional Islamic and other informal banking systems and has been used as a tool for trading in Southeast Asia (SE).

TERRORISM WITH A "SOUTHEAST ASIAN" FACE

There is a lot of evidence that Al-Qaeda is increasingly conducting financial transactions in Southeast Asia. They include creating fictitious companies, opening accounts for front persons, collecting charitable and other contributions, and carrying out various illegal activities. Al-Qaeda is believed to have established financial support structures in Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and the Philippines.

Terrorist activities in Southeast Asia are strongly influenced by Osama bin Laden and his "Shura Majlis", a kind of" supreme council " of leaders of terrorist organizations, and the source of their financial and material support. The strength of Al-Qaeda's influence is shown, for example, by the fact that in Indonesia it managed to persuade several radical Islamic groups to rise above their narrow political, national and religious views and join the Anti-American Terrorist Soldiers coalition to oppose the actions of the United States in Afghanistan.

Among the Indonesian Islamic parties that advocate the introduction of elements of Islamic law into official legal practice, many directly or indirectly conduct propaganda and agitation in support of the goals and objectives of Al-Qaeda. There are approximately 60 such groups, and the number of their supporters is very significant ^.4

The extremist Muslim group Jama'a Islamiya, which operates in Southeast Asia and aims to create a pan-Islamic state at the expense of the territories of Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, the Philippines and Brunei, is based in Indonesia and is supposed to have branches in a number of other Southeast Asian countries, and provides active financial and other support to Al-Qaeda. The latter, in turn, provides weapons and ammunition to affiliated groups of Abu Sayyaf and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) in the Philippines, Jama'a Islamiya in Indonesia and other Southeast Asian countries.

The fact that the Islamic fundamentalists of the region are increasingly being drawn into the international terrorist network, adopting the methods of struggle it has developed and relying on its material and financial base, is evidenced by the reaction in Southeast Asia to the events in Iraq. Right-wing Muslim leaders in Malaysia have already called on Muslims around the world to wage a holy war against the United States and Britain on the first day of military operations, which, of course, is not without reason.

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direct or indirect influence of bin Laden.

The United States has recently exerted considerable pressure on Southeast Asian countries to bring financial institutions under control in order to identify depositors and clients of banks linked to terrorism. Already in September 2001, that is, almost immediately after the well-known terrorist attack in the United States, Philippine President Gloria Arroyo instructed the government to draw up a list of "suspicious" financial organizations and "...neutralize their activities by legal means." However, there was no practical reaction from the Government to this order...

In Indonesia, the government issued a statement condemning international terrorism, declaring its readiness to stop the possible activities of commercial organizations controlled by bin Laden in the country, and officially announced that it had issued a decree under which the security services have the right to investigate the activities of suspicious banks. However, in November 2001, the Bank of Indonesia refused to comply with the request of the Prosecutor General's Office and freeze, at the request of the UN Security Council, 28 accounts of companies suspected of links with bin Laden, citing the law on deposit secrecy. It is well known in the country which companies are meant. The names of such Islamic groups as the Majlis Mujahideen, the Front of Defenders of Islam and the Jihad Army, which are believed to be created in Indonesia, may be involved in the money of Al-Qaeda. This situation reflects the state of Indonesian society, which has already made a failed attempt to pass the Sharia constitution through Parliament.

Muslim charitable foundations are particularly suspected of being involved in financing terrorist activities in Southeast Asian countries. But they are so numerous that it is almost impossible to control their activities. There are thousands of such funds in Indonesia alone. It is not easy to single out a relatively small number of those who are linked to terrorism from genuine benefactors. According to representatives of the US administration, who came to Indonesia to help the country solve the problem, this is tantamount to finding a needle in a haystack ^.5 At the end of 2001, the country adopted a law requiring non-governmental financial organizations to submit regular audit reports, but most Muslim funds are still far from transparent.

A TERRORIST ATTACK IS QUITE INEXPENSIVE

When studying the financing of Islamic terrorists, it should obviously be borne in mind that the flow of money and other valuables at their disposal is only one side of the issue. It is equally important to get an idea of how these funds are spent.

"Americans don't understand Muslim society, "said Dr. Saad al - Faghi, a Saudi dissident who heads the Movement for Reform of Islam in Arabia in London. "They don't understand how money works in this society." According to him, Americans underestimate the predominant role of cash and exaggerate the cost of committing even a major terrorist act. To carry out an operation like the one that was carried out on September 11, not billions or millions of dollars are needed , but several thousand will be enough, al-Fagi believes.

Indeed, according to the US prosecutor who investigated the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center in New York, the entire operation cost the terrorists less than $ 10,000. The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, as well as the bombings of the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, were also carried out with minimal monetary costs.

It is significant how the two suspected hijackers spent their last days - from August 26 to September 9. They were staying at a motel in Florida, renting a room for two for $ 250 a week. The owner of the motel said that they did their own laundry in the shared washing machine, brought food from the supermarket to cook in the room kitchen, and rented the cheapest cars. They paid the most for flying lessons. According to the Wall Street Journal, one paid $ 20,000 and the other $ 18,000. One was a student, but he was also involved in other activities, including selling used cars in an open area ^.6

When bin Laden needed to deliver a large shipment of Kalashnikov assault rifles to the Islamic Jihad radical group in Egypt, he did not hire a plane, boat or truck, but bought two camel caravans, as was established in court in connection with the bombings of American facilities.

In Indonesia, the production of explosive devices used in many terrorist attacks is established by local residents on one of the islands in the eastern part of the country. The cost of such devices, called "Molotov bombs" in Indonesia, is only about $ 10 apiece ^.7

It is clear that it is possible to commit very large-scale terrorist attacks even with their relatively small "budget". Bin Laden's extensive terrorist network is probably not very expensive for him, since it is largely "self-financed" by small businesses, as well as by crime. And that makes it particularly dangerous. For thousands of well-trained, as well as brought up on hostility and irreconcilability to another civilization, militants are capable of committing very large atrocities at relatively low material costs.

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¹ UN Security Council document S / 2002 / 1050, 20.09.2002.

² Ibid.

³ ITAR-TASS, 11.10.2001, "Compass" N 41, 2001.

⁴ "Inside Al Qaeda: Global Network of Terror" (Columbia University Press, New York).

⁵ "Far Eastern Economic Review", Hongkong, 15.11.2001.

⁶ ITAR-TASS, 11.10.2001, "Compass" N 41, 2001.

⁷ "Tempo", Jakarta, 20.08.2001, N 25.

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