IARA asset freeze is upheld

A federal appeals court on Tuesday upheld a lower court’s decision in 2005 to continue to block the assets of the Columbia-based Islamic American Relief Agency, or IARA-USA, citing the group’s links to a Sudan-based organization suspected of providing financial support to terrorists.

The Treasury Department froze the Columbia-based agency’s assets in October 2004. Court records show that the IARA-USA immediately challenged the decision to block its assets, asking the agency to unfreeze its funds to pay attorney’s fees and creditors.

In Tuesday’s decision, Judge David Sentelle of the Washington, D.C., Circuit of the U.S Court of Appeals wrote that the IARA-USA is a branch of the Islamic African Relief Agency in Sudan, an organization that is suspected of funneling money to al-Qaida and other terrorist groups.

Shareef Akeel, the Michigan lawyer representing the agency, could not be reached at his office for comment.

A woman picked up the phone at the number listed for Mubarek Hamed, the then-executive director of IARA-USA, and said he no longer lived at the residence.

No criminal charges were ever filed in connection with the IARA-USA investigation.

In the court’s decision, Sentelle wrote that the group “continued to engage in conduct that evinces a branch relationship with IARA,” noting that the group had applied in 1998 to the U.S. Treasury Department for a license to transfer funds to the Islamic African Relief Agency in Sudan. In that request, the group had described itself as the “Islamic African Relief Agency-U.S. Affiliate,” and had referred to the Sudanese group as its “partner in Sudan,” Sentelle wrote.

Sentelle added that IARA-USA was founded by an immigrant from Sudan, Mohammed El-Bashir, and was incorporated with a name identical to that of the IARA in Sudan until 2000.

That year, the group replaced “African” in its name with “American,” court records show.

“IARA-USA’s arguments fail in the face of clear and substantial evidence in the record,” Sentelle wrote.

The FBI, along with other agencies, including the Secret Service, Immigration Customs Enforcement and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, raided the IARA-USA’s Columbia headquarters at 201 E. Cherry St. in October 2004. They removed scores of boxes, 14 computers and seized cars at the small brick building tucked behind Walgreen’s at Providence Road and Broadway.

The group had denied any relation to the Islamic African Relief Agency in Sudan, the Missourian reported in November 2004. The agency in Sudan denied the Columbia-based agency was a branch of its organization.