US targets Bin Laden money networks

Individuals and organisations are being targeted

The United States Government has taken steps to freeze the assets of financial networks linked to Osama Bin Laden, the chief suspect behind the 11 September terror attacks.

The names of 62 groups and people have been added to a list of suspected terrorist associates signed by President George W Bush in an executive order last month.

They include Islamic money exchanges with offices in the US, which investigators say have funnelled tens of millions of dollars around the world to fund terrorist activities.

The list, which President Bush is due to make public later in the day, is also said to target assets in several countries, including Somalia, Liechtenstein, the Bahamas, Sweden, Canada, Austria, Italy and the United Arab Emirates.

Last month, President Bush signed an executive order freezing the US assets of 27 individuals and organisations suspected of having links with Bin Laden and his al-Qaeda network.

At the time, Mr Bush said the list was "the financial equivalent of law enforcement's most-wanted list".

Informal networks

Bush: A most-wanted list

The latest targets include two suspected Bin Laden financial networks, al-Taqua and al-Barakaat. The latter has offices in the US and several other countries.

They are informal, largely unregulated money exchanges networks known as hawalas.

Movements of cash through such networks are extremely hard to trace because they work on trust and often do not involve the physical transfer of funds.

BBC business reporter Mark Gregory says a phone call or a coded message from one country is sufficient to release money held in another.

Washington is also asking allies in at least nine countries to seize assets that help Bin Laden, the Associated Press news agency reported.

In an immediate reaction, police in Switzerland were reported to have arrested two Swiss-based Egyptian financiers allegedly linked to Bin Laden.