U.S. Warns on Security of Venezuelan Airports After Inspections Are Blocked

WASHINGTON -- The Department of Homeland Security issued a warning questioning the security of Venezuelan airports, a move that won't immediately block flights but may renew tensions about air travel between the countries.

DHS officials have been blocked from inspecting international airports in Venezuela to determine whether they comply with security standards adopted by the International Civil Aviation Organization, according to the department. U.S. inspectors have been trying for the past two years to gain access to Venezuela's main international hubs, including Simón Bolívar International Airport, outside the capital, Caracas, according to the U.S. embassy there.

The Venezuelan embassy in Washington didn't respond to a request to comment. Christopher White, a spokesman for the Transportation Security Administration, said beginning Tuesday, security checkpoints at U.S. airports will post warnings on travel to and from Venezuela. The warnings won't directly block flights or advise Americans to avoid flying to Venezuela; rather, they will state that TSA cannot verify that airports in Venezuela have proper security procedures in place.

"Venezuela has refused multiple requests to allow for such assessments, which are required by U.S. law, and the agency is taking action to warn travelers of this security deficiency," according to an advisory the TSA released Monday.

Martha Pantin, a spokeswoman for AMR Corp.'s American Airlines, which operates the most direct flights to Venezuela from the U.S., said the carrier believes security is adequate at Simón Bolívar International and at Venezuela's other main international airports.

"We think the airports are well run, and obviously for us, the safety of our passengers, our crews and our aircraft are of the utmost importance," Ms. Pantin said.

It is unclear how the Venezuelan government will respond, but tensions about safety and security have escalated in the past. In the mid-1990s, the Federal Aviation Administration lowered Venezuela's safety rating to Category 2, which meant Venezuelan carriers couldn't expand service in the U.S. and had to work with U.S. experts to make improvements. Eventually, Venezuela threatened to limit access to Venezuelan airports for American Airlines and other U.S. carriers. The FAA upgraded Venezuela's safety rating to Category 1 in 2006, easing strains and paving the way for expanded service.

Mr. White said the TSA isn't alarmed that unvetted passengers will board U.S.-bound flights. The vetting of passengers "is conducted by the airlines using the no-fly and selectee watch lists provided by TSA. This issue is with Venezuelan officials' not allowing TSA inspectors to verify that the airports themselves meet international security standards."

There are 10 daily flights from Venezuela to the U.S., Mr. White said, of which eight are operated by U.S.-based carriers. The security warning applies to four international airports serving as the last point of departure from Venezuela to the U.S. They are located in Caracas, Valencia, Barcelona and Maracaibo.

Write to Christopher Conkey at christopher.conkey@wsj.com

VICTORY #81: David Morrison rush to take off-line the Turkey ADD after UNDP-WATCH reporting

Today after 103 days in UNDP's main website, David Morrison the Director of Communications of UNDP called his office early, and started demanding that the Turkey ADD be immediately removed from the main web-page of UNDP Website.

This is yet another victory of UNDP Watchers who are going to continue to Watch and expose the wrong doings inside the UNDP and its cuppola.

Good job David Morrison, just don't forget about NetAid Money, we still want to know what you did with them .

UNDP accused over firm with suspected militant links

http://africa.reuters.com/wire/news/usnL1436115.html
Wed 14 May 2008, 11:42 GMT

[-] Text [+] By Mark Trevelyan, Security Correspondent

LONDON, May 14 (Reuters) - A U.N. agency supported a Somali money transfer firm with suspected links to Islamist militants in a project that was corrupt and failed to curb the risks of money laundering and terrorist finance, a former employee said.

Ismail Ahmed, who worked for the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), said the agency's Somalia country office had provided "critical support" to the company, Dalsan, between 2003 and 2005, including intervening on its behalf with Swiss prosecutors and U.S. regulators.

The case highlights the risks associated with the financial industry of a country widely seen as a failed state and potential breeding ground for terrorism. Somalia depends more than any other country on money remittances from abroad.

"The true cost of the fraud and corruption in this (UNDP) programme is not just the funds lost but how it damaged the Somali remittance industry," Ahmed wrote in a detailed dossier of allegations which he made available to Reuters.

"Overall, UNDP's remittance programme appears to have done more harm than good."

UNDP spokesman Stephane Dujarric said the agency was investigating Ahmed's corruption charges and his allegation that he was punished for blowing the whistle, including by having his contract terminated.

"Clearly UNDP takes all these allegations extremely seriously and we are in fact investigating them thoroughly," Dujarric said. He declined comment on specific allegations but said those relating to Dalsan would definitely be investigated.


MILITANT LINKS

Ahmed accused the UNDP of backing Dalsan -- which collapsed in 2006, leaving depositors with losses of $30 million -- despite knowing of its suspected links to militant groups.

Dalsan's co-founder, Mohamed Sheikh Osman, was once the official spokesman of Islamist movement al-Ittihad al-Islamiya, proscribed by the United States and U.N. as a terrorist group.

Chairman Abdilkadir Hashi Farah Ayro was the brother of Aden Hashi Ayro, head of the al Shabaab militant group and mastermind of an insurgency against Somali government troops and their Ethiopian allies, who was killed in a U.S. air strike on May 1.

Ahmed said in a telephone interview the UNDP, which was working to help the Somali financial industry comply with international anti-terrorism and anti-money laundering rules, backed Dalsan after another company boycotted its programme.

"They were desperate to get some support from the industry," he said. "They thought at the time it was a risk worth taking."

Ahmed, a British national of Somali origin with an economics doctorate and over 20 years of experience in Somali development issues, worked for the UNDP from 2005 to 2007 on a programme to support the Somali remittance industry and strengthen its compliance with anti-money laundering and anti-terrorism rules.

The UNDP launched the scheme in 2002 after the largest firm, al-Barakaat, was blacklisted by Washington after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States for funding terrorism.

In his dossier, Ahmed described support that the UNDP provided to Dalsan in Switzerland, the United States, Dubai, Britain and elsewhere. He said the UNDP's Somalia remittance programme had damaged the industry it was meant to help.

"UNDP interventions distorted the market by encouraging a number of unscrupulous and opportunistic companies to enter the market," he wrote. This led to an unusually high failure rate for Somali money transfer companies, with around 15 collapsing between November 2001 and May 2006.

He said money transfers of about $2 billion a year to Somalia and other Horn of Africa countries remain vulnerable to money laundering and terrorist finance -- channelling funds through the financial system for the benefit of militant groups.

"Two billion dollars are going through systems which are non-compliant, and that is pretty serious," he said. (Editing by Timothy Heritage)

UNDP Procurement: Curiouser and Curiouser

By George Russell

The United Nations Development Program’s procurement of airport body scanners last year on behalf of the Hugo Chavez government in Venezuela is generating controversy within U.N. Headquarters, as UNDP attempts to justify its actions.

On Thursday, UNDP posted a letter on its own web site from the scanners’ American manufacturer which ostensibly confirmed that the Venezuelan company which won UNDP’s procurement contract had purchased the scanners for UNDP’s project on August 30, 2007.

To see the letter, click here.

The problem is that the date and purchase order number cited in the letter do not match those in an official document from the same manufacturer that UNDP posted on its website two weeks ago. The older document, a notarized “certificate of origin” UNDP says was used to ship the equipment to Venezuela, asserts that the purchase was made on August 8, 2007 — three full weeks before the latest letter says the scanner purchase even existed.

To see the "certificate of origin," click here.

Casting even more confusion into the case, a letter from the Venezuelan company, Setronix C.A., to FOX News cites another date for UNDP’s purchase order: August 1, 2007 — putting the alleged deal a full month earlier than the manufacturer now says it took place.

The same letter claims that the number of scanners involved in the order had dropped from 19 to 17 — despite UNDP’s previous confirmation of the higher number in communications with FOX — because the company had tacked on an expensive three-year service package onto the deal after UNDP approved the procurement.

To see the Setronix letter, click here.

Yet copies of confidential UNDP headquarters procurement documents obtained by FOX News, which waived competitive bidding on the procurement, specifically note that the 19-scanner deal already included such a three-year service package.

To see the headquarters documents, click here.

The letter posted yesterday by UNDP from the scanner manufacturer, L-3 Communications, is only the latest in a blizzard of documentation UNDP has been posting to justify the “objectivity, transparency, efficiency” of the $2,375,000 scanner procurement, which UNDP says took place as part of an effort to modernize the customs service of Chavez’s radical leftist regime.

On April 1, FOX News questioned the deal on the basis of the UNDP headquarters waiver of competition, and after the highly respected U.S. defense contractor that manufactured the equipment, L3 Communications, declared that it had only shipped 17 scanners to Venezuela, and these were for the country’s correctional system, not the customs and tax authority cited by UNDP.

Two days later, UNDP posted documents on its website which FOX News pointed out contained different totals for the scanners, offered two different dates for the same purchase order, and produced a “project document” for the deal that terminated 3 1/2 years before the purchase was made, and never mentioned airports or scanners at all.

As part of its latest documentation drive, UNDP yesterday produced additional documents on its website, which it said made clear that the original project document had been extended several times, into 2008.

The website emphasized that “had [FOX] checked with UNDP before publishing, we would have been pleased” to point out that fact.

The internal properties of the electronic PDF file that UNDP posted show that the project extension documents were not assembled as an electronic file until April 9, 2008, or five days after FOX pointed out the deficiencies of the initial “project document.”

To see those properties, click here.

UNDP Documents show Setronix a supplier to the Quartermaster General of National Arm Forces of Venezuela

The saga of the scanners for Venezuela continue, raising more and more suspicion on the existence of such procurement and the continuing involvement of UNDP in dirty deals with dictators around the world. Now UNDP publish documents which prove that Setronix, the contractor selected from UNDP in a waiver of competitive biding, was and still is a supplier for the quartermaster general for National Arm Forces of Venezuela.

On April 16th UNDP's David Morrison continued with it's version of the Venezuela story. UNDP produced in their For-the-record (blog) two documents from Setronix which were supposed to prove the existence of the scanners.

David Morrison stated that:

Number of scanners: The original number of scanners was 19. During the
lengthy procurement process, however, the price of the scanners went up. Precisely to accommodate this contingency, UNDP Resident Representatives are given limited authority to adjust contracts accordingly. On the scanner contract, after consulting with SENIAT, UNDP reduced the number of scanners to 17, and increased the overall amount of the contract by $5000. Even at the increased price, the L3 Communications scanners were much less expensive than those in rival bids.The procurement was done in two shipments, one for 16 scanners and the other for one scanner. (Click on following two links to view the documents for all 17 scanners: 1, 2).

First of all both these document clearly indicate that Setronix was and is a supplier for the Quartermaster General for National Arm Forces of Venezuela. Instead of proof of arrivals documents are direct indisputable proof of movement/shipment of equipment from one military base to another. Raising direct question of allege use of equipment from "public".

The problem is that both documents produced from UNDP are neither the Certificates of Customs nor the Lending Certificates which, as per UNDP procurement rules, would have been proof of shipment. Both documents are hand created documents which describes the transportation of certain equipment from one city to another city in Venezuela, and nor the dates nor the cities mentioned in the both documents refer to the port of arrival (or airport) of the initial L3 document which UNDP put online.


More important is that the latest document produced from UNDP (2) has been produced on April 3 - 2008, only days after the first story of FOX NEWS, and it contains a different seal of SENIAT on the document. This date is totally different with the statement of Setronix that the equipment arrived in Venezuela in Nov 2007.


But more important is that in the letter to FOX NEWS on April 11, 2008 , Setronix - the UNDP's contractor admits that the 1 unit out of 17 left Miami International airport and arrived at Simon Bolivar International Airport in Venezuela on Nov 11, 2007. (while in the alleged certificate is indicated April 3, 2008). In the same document Setronix indicate that they had received from UNDP - 90% of the contract payment. While none of the documents provided above is prove of existence or of the implementation of the said scanners in any given Venezuelan public Airport, nor they prove that such equipment are for public use by public administration and not the military (as in fact stated in both docs 1, 2)

Based on UNDP internal processes and rules, the above raises important questions:

• So who at UNDP's Venezuela Office cleared this procurement ?
• Who went to the receiving airport or port customs to receive the goods and clear the goods ?
• Who signed on PO and released the 90% of the payments and based on which proof of goods and certificate of good-condition?
• Who cleared this payment at UNDP's HQs Finance Unit and based on which supporting documentation?

How far should member states hear to these lies from a public funded organization, that is so irresponsible that issues payment to a supplier for the Quartermaster General for National Arm Forces of Venezuela, before installation or proof of delivery ?

Where are the pictures of the equipments purchased from UNDP ?