Official Says Swiss Authorities Were Rushed Into Moving On Al Taqwa

by Ulrika Lomas, Tax-News.com, Brussels

13 November 2001

Speaking to reporters on Thursday the deputy Swiss prosecutor Claude Nicati intimated that the Swiss authorities had been forced to move before they were ready on organisations suspected of having links to terrorist organisations.

'I would have liked to know better the...various links, but the publication by the United States of a list of people and organizations linked to international terrorism in effect fixed a deadline for taking action,' Mr Nicati admitted. He told journalists that it would take at least three weeks to analyze the documents seized from the Al Taqwa organisation late last week.

Pier Felice Barchi, lawyer for the Al Taqwa network of companies, has said that he is confident that the investigation 'will end in nothing', and many Swiss officials seem to feel the same way, according to reports. Mr Barchi says that the organisation acted mainly as an accountant for businesspeople in the Middle East, conducting 'feasibility studies' on investments throughout the world, and herein lies the problem- Swiss law does not specifically address Al Taqwa's activities. Because the Swiss arm of the organisation was not a bank (although the Al Taqwa did operate a bank in the Bahamas until a government crackdown forced it to close earlier this year), auditing and other requirements for banks operating in the jurisdiction do not apply, which will make it substantially more difficult for the Swiss authorities to investigate.

Prosecutors are also likely to run up against the reserve and discretion traditionally found in the Swiss banking and financial services sector. As one intelligence official revealed to the Washington Post on Monday: 'No one in Switzerland asks why anybody receives money. It's just not done. The whole economy depends on such activities.'

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