Response to ‘British Airways Employee Faces Terrorism Charges’

The news report I have attached below was posted by CNN on March 11 and is significant because it relates back to two of the issues I have been attempting to get our leaders to focus on since the terrorist attacks that were launched against our nation as far back as 1993 when in January of that year, two CIA officials were killed and three others wounded by Mir Kansi, an alien from Pakistan who succeeded in securing political asylum in our country through fraud and one month later when other aliens who had similarly gamed the immigration bureaucracy of the United States launched an attack at the World Trade Center, killing six, injuring hundreds and inflicting an estimated one half billion dollars on that once iconic component of New York City’s famed skyline.

As most of you know, I redoubled those efforts in the wake of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 when a team of 19 terrorists who also gamed the immigration system as well as the visa issuing process managed to enter our nation and carry out the most savage and destructive attack ever carried out within the borders of the United States since the inception of our nation.

The news report I have attached below addresses the efforts of a British citizen by the name of Rajib Karim who acquired his British citizenship through that country’s naturalization process. I certainly will not profess to have any expertise in the way that Great Britain processes applications for naturalization, but the point worth noting is that Mr. Karim would not need a visa in order to enter the United States because Great Britain is one of some 36 nations that participate in the Visa Waiver Program.

Karim was born in Bangladesh and most certainly as a citizen of Bangladesh, he would have needed a visa in order to seek to enter the United States.

While I do not know the motivation that Rajib Karim may have had for seeking to acquire a British passport, but it is worth noting that terrorist organizations place a high value on citizens of those European nations that do participate in that wrong-headed program.

The other issue is the issue of the naturalization process that enables aliens to change their citizenship or, possibly add to their countries of citizenship. One of the disturbing issues is the fact that Great Britain has, from what I have read, hundreds of thousands of dual national citizens who, in addition to being citizens of Great Britain, hold citizenship (and passports) of Pakistan and other so-called “special interest” countries such as Bangladesh.

Special Interest countries are those countries that are associated with terrorism and include Yemen, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran and others.

The problem about these dual nationals who hold passports from both Great Britain and these Special Interest countries is that these individuals can easily travel from England to the Middle East through an intermediate country and, making use of their other passport, are able to cover their tracks. To provide an example of this, consider a citizen of England who is headed to a terrorist training camp in the Middle East. In order to cover his (her) tracks, he may opt to use his British passport to travel to a country such as Germany or Spain. Once he arrives in that other European country he conceals his British passport and then proceeds to use his other passport, i.e., eg., his Pakistani or Bangladesh passport to travel to the Middle East- for argument sake, Yemen. For the balance of his travels he uses his Pakistani passport and then returns to Spain, Germany or some other European country on that Middle Eastern passport. Finally, he conceals his Middle Eastern passport and uses his British passport to travel home to England.

By scrutinizing his British passport alone, it is impossible to determine if he traveled anywhere other than to Germany or Spain.

This ability to travel “under the radar” and to not require a visa in order to travel to the United States provides citizens of Middle Eastern countries who are engaged in terrorism with tremendous incentive to seek to naturalize in a European country that participates in the Visa Waiver Program.

The naturalization process is similarly of great value where the United States is concerned. Yet, as I have noted in ever so many of my previous commentaries, the system by which USCIS (United States Citizenship and Immigration Services) processes applications for naturalization is a “system” in name only-with a staggering fraud rate making a mockery of the process and exposing our nation and our citizens to a huge threat.

A number of spies and terrorists have been found to have used the immigration processes as a means of entering our nation and embedding themselves once they get here. Citizenship truly represents the “Keys to the Kingdom” for the United States of America.

Yet while USCIS runs its bureaucratic conveyor belt ever more rapidly in a futile effort to keep up with the onslaught of applications arriving on the desks of those beleaguered adjudicators at USCIS each and every day, the administration and Congressional luminaries such as Senator Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, John McCain and other, are once again attempting to foist “Comprehensive Immigration Reform” down our throats.

In July of 2007 when the United States Senate once again attempted to enact “Comprehensive Immigration Reform” against the wishes of the vast majority of the citizens of this nation, I wrote a commentary for the Washington Times in which I opined that an honest and more descriptive name for that bit of legislative betrayal should have been the “Terrorist Assistance and Facilitation Act!” Considering how many times We the People have made our opposition to that legislative nightmare known and how many times it has been resurrected and how many times Schumer, Pelosi and company have hit it with the paddles and performed CPR on it, perhaps it should henceforth be referred to as the “Freddy Krueger Act!”

On another matter; while our government officials often tout how great the Visa Waiver Program is and how it enhances national security, nothing could be further from the truth! This is all about public relations and a concerted effort to provide the lobbyists for the travel and hospitality industries what they have been spending millions of dollars on- the expansion of the Visa Waiver Program under the auspices of a public relations campaign known as “Discover America.” As I often like to point out, they need to remember that al Qaeda has already discovered America!

The “spin doctors” in our government have most certainly already exceeded the “red line” on their tachometers! Consider that the day after a Delta Airliner was nearly turned into aluminum confetti in the skies over Detroit, an act that would have undoubtedly killed all on board that airliner and, most likely, a significant number of victims who were unfortunate enough to have been under what would have been tons of flaming wreckage, Secretary of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano initially issued a statement in which she had the chutzpah to state that the “System worked!”

As you may recall, I wrote a commentary about this insane statement and said, “If hope is not a strategy, then dumb luck is not a success!” Do you wonder why I have come to refer to DHS as being the “Department of Homeland Surrender?”

I recently posted my “top six” list of the benefits an effectively managed visa program can provide for the United States. At the risk of being repetitious, I have decided to provide you with that list below, once again:

You can review the State Department Website for information about this wrong-headed, indeed extremely perilous program at:

http://travel.state.gov/visa/temp/without/without_1990.html

Six benefits the visa requirement provides to national security

1. By requiring visas of aliens who seek to enter the United States, this process helps to screen potential passengers on airliners that are destined to the United States. Richard Reid, the so-called “Shoe Bomber” was able to board an airliner to come to the United States although he had no intentions of entering the United States, his apparent goal was to blow up the airliner and its many passengers somewhere over the depths of the Atlantic Ocean by detonating explosives he had concealed in his shoes. Because he is a subject of Great Britain, a country that participates in the Visa Waiver Program, Reid did not obtain a visa before he boarded that airliner.

2. The CBP inspectors are supposed to make a decision in one minute or less as to the admissibility of an alien seeking to enter the United States. The visa requirement helps them to do a more effective job. Theirs is a tough job I can certainly relate to, I began my career at the former INS as an immigration inspector at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York and worked there for 4 years before I became a special agent.

3. The application for a nonimmigrant visa contains roughly 40 questions that could provide invaluable information to law enforcement officials should that alien become the target of a criminal or terrorist investigation. The information could provide intelligence as well as investigative leads. You can check out the application for a nonimmigrant (tourist) visa by clicking on this link: https://evisaforms.state.gov/ds156.asp

4. If an alien applicant lies on the application for a visa that lie is called “visa fraud.” The maximum penalty for visa fraud starts out at 10 years in jail for those who commit this crime simply in order to come to the United States, ostensibly to seek unlawful employment or other such purpose. The penalty increases to 15 years in jail for those aliens who obtain a visa to commit a felony. For aliens who engage in visa fraud to traffic in narcotics or commit another narcotics-related crime, the maximum jail sentence that can be imposes rises to 20 years. Finally, when an alien can be proven to have engaged in visa fraud in furtherance of terrorism, the maximum penalty climbs to 25 years in prison. It is important to note that while it may be difficult to prove that an individual is a terrorist, it is usually relatively simple to prove that the alien has committed visa fraud when there is fraud involved in the visa application. Indeed, terror suspects are often charged with visa fraud.

5. The charge of visa fraud can also be extremely helpful to law enforcement authorities who want to take a bad guy off the street without tipping their hand to the other members of a criminal conspiracy or terrorism conspiracy that the individual arrested was being arrested for his involvement in terrorism or a criminal organization. You can arrest the alien who commits visa fraud for that violation of law and not for other charges that might make it clear that the investigation underway is targeting a criminal or terrorist organization.

6. Even when an alien applies for a visa and his application is denied, the application he filed remains available for law enforcement and intelligence personnel to review to seek to glean intelligence from that application.

Incidentally, you may be interested to know that just last week the administration announced that Greece would be added to the list of countries that participate in the dangerous Visa Waiver Program even as even more intrusive searches are being conducted at many airports across the United States. With the economic meltdown now hammering Greece, do you suppose that a number of citizens of that economically beleaguered nation might decide to attempt to enter the United States to seek jobs and money they can send home to assist their families? The visa process can also help to screen out those who are seeking entry into our country to obtain illegal employment. Apparently our “leaders” could care less about this possibility!

Before the Second World War, the enforcement and administration of the immigration laws was carried out by the United States Department of Labor because, back then, our government was actually concerned about the negative impact a flood of foreign workers would have on the American worker and his family!

Ask the current crop of politicians who favor Comprehensive Immigration Reform and the ever expanding Visa Waiver Program if they give a damn about the citizens they were elected to represent!

My goal in writing this and other commentaries is to point out our nations many failings before more victims pay the ultimate price for the incompetence and ineptitude of our government.

The first step in problem-solving is to first identify the problems and vulnerabilities and then devise strategies to overcome them.

Any politician who refuses to work to secure our borders and create an immigration system that has integrity is either corrupt or too dumb to keep his (her) job. Any politician, irrespective of party affiliation who favors Comprehensive Immigration Reform and the outrageous betrayal that this would represent given the national security implications that this program would have, should be shown the door at the next election!

If you find yourself to be in agreement with this commentary, I ask that you forward it to as many of your friends and family members as possible and encourage them to do the same.

Later this year, each and every member of the House of Representatives is up for reelection. Later this year more than one third of the members of the United States Senate will have to face their constituents. They need to be reminded that they work for us, We the People!

However, the practice of good citizenship does not end in the voting booth, it only begins there. The large scale apathy demonstrated by citizens of this nation has emboldened elected representatives to all but ignore the needs of the average American citizen in a quest for massive campaign funds and the promises of votes to be ostensibly delivered by special interest groups. There is much that we cannot do but there is one thing that We the People absolutely must do- we must stop sitting on the sidelines!

The collective failure of We the People to get involved in make our concerns known to our politicians have nearly made the concerns of the great majority of the citizens of this nation all but irrelevant to the politicians. I implore you to get involved!

Any American who has lost his job certainly has enough time on his (her) hands to get involved!

Any American who fears the loss of his job must make effective use of his spare time to make certain he keeps his job! (Remember, the job save may be your own!) If this situation concerns you or especially if it angers you, I ask you to call your Senators and Congressional “Representative. This is not only your right- it is your obligation!

You need to politely but pointedly, demand to know what they are doing to protect our nation. You need to ask them how they are protecting you and your families. You can also forward this commentary to them and ask them to watch the 60 Minutes report that served as the basis for my commentary. All I ask is that you make it clear to our politicians that we are not as dumb as they hope we are! We live in a perilous world and in a perilous era. The survival of our nation and the lives of our citizens hang in the balance This is neither a Conservative issue, nor is it a Liberal issue- simply stated, this is most certainly an AMERICAN issue! You are either part of the solution or you are a part of the problem!

British Airways employee faces terrorism charges

Artist’s sketch shows Rajib Karim in court on Thursday.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

30-year-old BA employee appears in court on terror charges Rajib Karim employeed by BA as an information technology developer.

Authorities allege he sent money to Yemen and Bangladesh to fund terrorist activities.

Police learned about alleged activities from encrypted data on his home computer.

London, England (CNN) – A British Airways employee accused of funding terrorism and planning suicide bombings – including his own – appeared in court Thursday. Prosecutor Colin Gibb called the suspect, Rajib Karim, “a very dangerous individual, facing very serious offenses and likely to face a serious term of imprisonment.”

Authorities said Karim – who was born in Bangladesh and is now a British citizen – collected money in Britain and sent it to Yemen and Bangladesh to fund terrorist activities. British authorities believe he had significant success in financing terrorist operations, security sources with knowledge of the case told CNN.

Video: Alleged bomber meticulous

Michael Cutler, a former Senior INS Investigator, an expert witness in more than a dozen Congressional Hearings is a Fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies and an advisor to the ‘911 Families for a Secure America.’ He writes about the nexus between immigration and national security.