US officials arrested the head of a Muslim charity today on perjury charges, and accused him of having links with Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda network stretching back 10 years.
Mr Enaam Arnauot (39), executive director of Benevolence International Foundation, was arrested at his home in Chicago this morning by members of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
The Syrian-born US citizen is expected to appear in US district court later today on charges that he lied in federal court documents about links to international terrorism, the local states attorney's office said in a statement.
The move is the latest chapter of a legal battle between the charity and the US government which froze the organisation's assets and records as part of an official US crackdown on charitable organisations thought to be funnelling money to Islamic terrorist regimes last year.
In January, BIF filed a lawsuit against attorney general Mr John Ashcroft seeking to overturn that order.
But in local prosecutors allege Mr Arnaout lied about what BIF's longstanding and wide-ranging links to Islamic radical groups including al-Qaeda, the Chechen mujahideen and Hezb e Islami, a military group operating in Afghanistan and Azerbaijan in those court papers.
In a 35-page FBI affidavit supporting the charges, prosecutors said BIF had contacts with Mr Mamdouh Salim - a key Bin Laden aide - and that Bin Laden even entrusted one of his wives to the care of Mr Arnaout in Pakistan in 1989.
They also documented contacts between BIF and individuals who were found to be obtain chemical and nuclear weapons on behalf of al-Qaeda.
AFP