It has been nearly seven years since the September 11th attacks, but the U.S. Treasury Department continues to shield critical information from the public about the financial activities of Specially Designated Global Terrorists

Exposing Terror Financing: Who is Treasury Protecting Under Its Veil of Secrecy?
By Andrew Cochran

It has been nearly seven years since the September 11th attacks, but the U.S. Treasury Department continues to shield critical information from the public about the financial activities of Specially Designated Global Terrorists (SDGT). Treasury has evaded demands for improved disclosure of its investigations. The public has a right and a need to know the factual findings of these important investigations, such as the names of the terrorists and important details of their financial records. Such disclosures will allow the public, specifically financial institutions, to ensure that terrorists are unable to move money through the banking system. It will also allow victims of terrorism to obtain the necessary information to know who is responsible for their injuries and losses. Shielding these important facts from the public domain allows terrorists to exploit bureaucratic turf-battles to wage their deadly jihad. To date, Treasury has not publicly provided a sound reason for this secrecy. The time has come to change these policies.

One such example of Treasury’s intransigence involves its 2005 investigation of Arab Bank plc. After receiving a tip from a private citizen, the Treasury’s Office of the Comptroller of Currency (OCC) led an investigation with the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) to determine whether Arab Bank, a leading Middle Eastern financial institution, adequately implemented anti-money laundering laws. Their investigation concluded that the bank failed to comply with the Bank Secrecy Act (see Jonathan Winer’s November 17, 2006 post). A $24 million fine was levied against the bank, resulting in the second-largest fine ever rendered under the Act (see Victor Comras’ August 17. 2005 post).

Despite the publicity of this judgment and repeated calls from Congress, the Treasury Department has yet to release the factual contents of its report to the public (see this August 17, 2005 post by then-Contributing Expert Lee Wolosky). In explaining the investigation, the OCC’s Acting Comptroller, Julie Williams, testified before a 2005 House Committee on Financial Services hearing (see page 19 of the hearing transcript), that

“[T]he OCC compiled a list of individuals and entities with the same or similar names as reputed terrorists or terrorist organizations using publicly available information sources… We ran that list against the branch’s system…. [O]ur review disclosed that the branch had handled hundreds of suspicious wire transactions involving individuals and entities with the same or similar names as suspected terrorists and terrorist organizations and that many of the individuals and entities were customers of Arab Bank or its affiliates.” (emphasis added)

A year later in June 2006, during another hearing by the same committee, then-Rep. Sue Kelly followed up on this matter and called for a release of summaries of the Arab Bank investigation. OCC Deputy Comptroller for Compliance Policy, Ann Jaedicke, responded that such a question was, “a supervisory matter…we do not intend to release the records” (see pages 27 and 28 of the hearing transcript).

To date, the OCC and FinCen have refused to release the factual findings of their investigation of Arab Bank to the public, citing the bank examination privilege. Initially designed to encourage banks to cooperate fully with an OCC examination, the privilege is now being used by the OCC to hinder disclosure of important information. Although they are allowed under this privilege, the OCC has refused to release the factual content of their reports. The OCC’s own regulations

“[R]ecognize the public’s interest in obtaining access to relevant and necessary information and the countervailing public interest of maintaining the effectiveness of the OCC supervisory process and appropriate confidentiality of OCC supervisory information.”

The OCC’s refusal to release information to the public stems from the agency’s misguided sense of duty which places the OCC’s operational interests and the confidentiality interests of the banks it supervises above the public’s safety and the rights of terrorism victims to hold those responsible for their injuries.

Financial transactions of Specially Designated Global Terrorists should not be entitled to any secrecy protections. The findings of this and other investigations should be open to public scrutiny, particularly the names that the Treasury Department ran against Arab Bank plc accounts, so that other institutions can ensure they do not maintain accounts or engage in wire transfers on behalf of these suspected terrorists.

Secrecy has the unfortunate side-effect of hiding accountability. Only through more cooperation and public participation will we be able to fully eliminate terror-financing. Providing banks and the public with the factual evidence from these investigations is an essential step in preventing terrorists from further utilizing our banking system to funnel money for their operations.

Seven years after the 9/11 attacks, we can only hope that our government agencies have learned to better engage with the public and understand that disclosing factual information helps their important work.

Disclosure Note: I have represented the concerns and views of terrorism victims on this issue to Congress.
July 28, 2008 01:39 PM