Oregon Live: Cold War Rivals Join Against New Foe -- With Oregon Ties
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posted by eagle on October, 2009 as ANALYSIS / OPINION
Cold War rivals join against new foe -- with Oregon tiesOctober 10, 2009, 8:14PMThey gathered in a conference room in Moscow, intent on swapping information about a dead Islamic charity in Oregon.
Federal prosecutors Charles Gorder and Chris Cardani were on one side. They had traveled from Oregon to Russia seeking proof that Al Haramain Islamic Foundation Inc. had been involved in terrorism.
On the other side sat agents from Russia's Federal Security Service, who were about to get copies of computer hard drives from southern Oregon that could yield clues about dead Russian soldiers.
Recent federal court filings in the pending criminal case of Pete Seda revealed the unusual trading session that took place last December, providing new details prosecutors say help prove that Seda and his small Ashland charity illegally backed foreign guerrilla fighters in Chechnya.
Seda, who founded the charity 10 years ago, is charged with conspiracy and tax fraud, accused of diverting money overseas for foreign Islamic fighters.
Seda's lawyers contend Gorder and Cardani had no business turning over to the Russians copies of 10 computer hard drives seized in Ashland more than five years ago. They said in a court filing that the move was an "outrageous intrusion" into Seda's privacy and asked a judge to bar the government from using the computers as evidence.
Gorder and Cardani, assistant U.S. attorneys, said in the new filings that the arrangement was legal under international treaty. They say they brought home evidence that Al Haramain wasn't the humanitarian organization it claimed to be.
A judge has yet to rule on the competing claims. The prosecutors declined to comment on recent events, as did Seda's lawyers, Federal Defender Steve Wax and Portland attorney Larry Matasar.
Seda, 51, and three Saudis formed Al Haramain as the American arm of huge Saudi Islamic charity. Al Haramain distributed religious material to U.S. prisons and operated a prayer house, and then fell under suspicion of federal terrorism investigators.
FBI visit, then a trip abroad
After a visit from the FBI in 2003, Seda went overseas. The following year, federal authorities designated Al Haramain a supporter of terrorism. Prosecutors subsequently charged Seda with illegally using a $150,000 donation to support mujahedeen, the Islamic fighters.
Seda, a onetime arborist born in Iran as Pirouz Sedaghaty, returned to Oregon in 2007 to deny tax and conspiracy charges. He has consistently maintained he opposed terrorist acts and worked instead to promote interfaith peace. He was freed pending his trial despite prosecutors' efforts to cast him as a sympathizer of terrorists. His trial, scheduled for next month, has been postponed again, in part because Seda wants time to consider the new Russian information.
Seda's lawyers learned of the trade when prosecutors turned over to them 178 pages of translated documents and audio- and videotapes. The material, they said, showed "a quid pro quo arrangement: the Russians wanting information about one of the individuals who had formerly resided in Ashland with Mr. Sedaghaty, the United States wanting to obtain information from the Russians."
Seda's lawyers didn't identify that person. They requested a court hearing to learn, among other things, whether prosecutors restricted how the Russians could use the computer information and whether that information had been handed over to other countries.
In their response, prosecutors outlined what they gave the Russians and why they did so.
Gorder and Cardani said Russia might "account for its own soldiers" through the identity papers and photos of Russian soldiers found on the computers half a globe away in Ashland. The soldiers were captured or killed fighting the mujahedeen in Chechnya, the venue for long-running battles between Russian and Islamic forces.
Prosecutors also gave the Russians evidence that "one of defendant Sedaghaty's so-called Islamic wives" used Al Haramain computers in Ashland to translate material into Russian. Her translations appeared on qoqaz.net, a Web site supporting jihad in Chechnya, prosecutors said.
Prosecutors submitted to the judge what they said was a posting from 2000 purporting to advise Muslims how to help the Chechen cause. "If you are not trained, then the mujahedeen in Chechnya advise you to go and get some training first in countries like Afghanistan," the document said. It urged discretion: "You should only speak in confidence to those whom you trust, rather than speaking to everyone."
Gorder and Cardani said the Russians shared with them information that Al Haramain had smuggled money into Chechnya for a mujahedeen training camp. "The money from this so-called charity was used 'to purchase weapons, uniforms, medicine, communication devices, vehicles, and to pay religious extremists' salaries,'" the prosecutors said in their filing.
They said the Russians turned over intercepted communications. Prosecutors cited communication between the leader of foreign Islamic fighters in Chechnya and Aqeel Abdul Aziz Al-Aqil, once president of both the Saudi and Oregon charities.
A key communiqué
Al-Aqil is quoted as saying, "The cargo is ready to be shipped: RPGs and rounds of ammunition for them, along with rounds for other systems; machine guns, Kalashnikov assault rifles, sniper rifles." The message also mentioned an anti-tank weapon and bulletproof vests.
The communication could be significant because Seda and Al Haramain have said money sent overseas was for humanitarian aid to Chechen refugees. They also have challenged the government's characterization of the Chechen fighting as a terrorist enterprise.
The charity's attorneys meantime continue challenges on two other fronts. In Portland federal court, they are trying to overturn the federal government's designation of the charity as a supporter of terrorism. Treasury Department officials have not retreated from their contention that Al Haramain supported al-Qaida.
In another case drawing sustained national attention, the charity is pressing its case against a Bush-era surveillance program. The charity's lawyers got what may be the only evidence outside the government of illegal domestic wiretapping. Federal officials inadvertently provided to Al Haramain's lawyers what has been described as a "top secret" log of intercepted telephone calls involving charity officials. The U.S. Justice Department has fought unsuccessfully to have the case tossed because it would reveal national secrets. The case is pending in a California federal court.
-- Les Zaitz
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