'METH' MONEY LINKED TO MIDEAST TERRORIST

Drug Ring Has Ties To Colorado, DEA Says

WASHINGTON - Federal authorities have amassed evidence for the first time
that an illegal drug operation with ties to Colorado has been funneling
proceeds to Middle Eastern terrorist groups such as Hezbollah.

Evidence gathered by the Drug Enforcement Administration since a series of
raids in January indicates that a methamphetamine drug operation in the
Midwest involving men of Middle Eastern descent has been shipping money
back to terrorist groups, officials said.

"There is increasing intelligence information from the investigation that
for the first time alleged drug sales in the United States are going in
part to support terrorist organizations in the Middle East," DEA
administrator Asa Hutchinson said.

DEA officials said the men, most of whom were indicted on drug charges
after their January arrests, were smuggling large quantities of the
chemical pseudoephedrine from Canada into the Midwest.

The drug ring was broken up Jan. 10 as part of a massive DEA investigation
called Operation Mountain Express, which has smashed several major
methamphetamine operations in the past two years.

Arrests were made in Detroit, Cleveland, Chicago, Phoenix and several
California cities.

Several people were arrested in Colorado. Syrian-born Hassan Zaghmot, who
was accused of helping supply methamphetamine ingredients to clandestine
labs, pleaded guilty in January to conspiracy to distribute a
methamphetamine ingredient.

Zaghmot, a naturalized U.S. citizen, was jailed in Syria earlier this year
after a federal judge allowed him to travel there to visit his ailing
mother. ,

He was one of 10 people accused of heading a ring in Colorado called "the
Commission," which authorities said set up front companies to buy and ship
methamphetamine ingredients to clandestine labs in Southern California.

Two other Denver men also were arrested. Nael Ziyadeh,38, owner of Z- Mart
in Denver, was charged with conspiring to distribute pseudoephedrine, and
Wael Zeidah, 35, an employee of Key Bank, was charged with money laundering.

At the time of the arrest, then U.S. Attorney Tom Strickland said the men
"were pretty high up in the food chain" in the methamphetamine operation.

Officials said the smuggling went through two primary Midwest locations,
Chicago and Detroit, and involved several men with ties to Jordan, Yemen,
Lebanon and other Middle Eastern countries. There is no evidence that any
of the money was connected to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, officials said.

Pseudoephedrine is used in some popular cold and allergy medications. It is
an essential ingredient in the creation of methamphetamine, a powerful and
increasingly popular drug known on the streets as "ice," "poor man's
cocaine" or "crystal meth." Users generally inject or smoke meth.

The powdery substance is produced by heating about a dozen chemicals.

The U.S. drug ring was reselling pseudoephedrine to Mexican-based drug
operations in the Western United States that used the pseudoephedrine to
produce methamphetamine, authorities said.

The Middle Eastern men then were diverting some of the proceeds from the
pseudoephedrine sales back to the Middle East to accounts authorities have
begun to connect to terrorist groups, DEA officials said.

Some of the connections involved the Iranian-backed terror group Hezbollah,
and some of the money has been traced to accounts in Lebanon and Yemen,
officials said.

DEA officials said U.S. authorities don't know yet how much money was
funneled from the drug sales to the terrorist groups, but said the
pseudoephedrine sales alone amounted to millions of dollars.

"A significant portion of some of the sales are sent to the Middle East to
benefit terrorist organizations," Hutchinson said.

The raids have resulted in criminal charges against 136 people and the
seizure of nearly 36 tons of pseudoephedrine, 179 pounds of
methamphetamine, $4.5 million in cash, eight real estate properties, and
160 cars used by the drug gangs.

Hutchinson has been warning for months that illegal drug money provides a
compelling opportunity for terror groups to siphon support from the United
States, but the DEA investigation provided the first evidence of a direct
flow of money.

The evidence of the terror ties emerged after the arrests. U.S. authorities
said it is possible some defendants charged with drug violations could face
additional charges.