The Case Against Youssef Nada and Al Taqwa: Will Switzerland Now Prosecute?

By Victor Comras

There are growing signs that Switzerland will soon file formal criminal charges against Youssef Nada and his al Taqwa bank. Switzerland may also be prepared to follow up on a similar case against Saudi businessman Yasin Al-Qadi (see my earlier posting). These cases are likely to be a main topic of conversation when Swiss Justice Minister Christoph Blocher visits Washington this week The Swiss government has been working on the Nada case for over three years. Swiss and Italian police searched Nada�s Offices in Lugano and his home in Campione d�Italia shortly after he was designated by the U.S. Treasury Department and the UN Al Qaeda Sanctions Committee in November 2001. But, these local investigations failed to come up with sufficient evidence to prosecute. The Swiss then turned to the United States for further information.

The US Treasury Department wrote Swiss Deputy Federal prosecutor Claude Nicati in January 2002 laying out the reasons for Nada�s designation. The letter claimed that al-Taqwa and its founder, Youssef M. Nada, used concealed bank accounts, complex land deals and other hard-to-trace methods to channel funds to al Qaeda and other terrorist groups. It had also provided a clandestine line of credit to one of bin Baden�s lieutenants subsequently implicated in the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings. Nicati came to the US in early 2002 to get the evidence backing up these claims. But, he left empty handed. The US agencies involved refused to provide the information which came from intelligence sources. The Swiss government complained at the time that without this information they could not proceed with the case against Nada or al Taqwa.

An agreement was finally reached last year when Attorney General Ashcroft visited Switzerland in June 2004 to exchange information on this and other terrorism related cases. Swiss Prosecutor Valentin Roschacher told the press at that time that an �Operative Working Arrangement� had been worked out to permit such information to be exchanged. But the accord has come in for heavy criticism in Switzerland, particularly since the government had not sought parliament's approval for it. Roschacher has assured his constituents that this arrangement would expire as soon as the terrorism investigations were completed.

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