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The Golden Chain
Q: What is the Golden Chain list and was there a connection to Khalid Bin Mahfouz?
A:The Golden Chain list, supposedly drawn up in 1988, contains the names of 20 prominent Saudi Arabian businessmen including that of a 'Bin Mahfouz' (no first name prefixed) and it is asserted by the plaintiffs in the Burnett suit that those named all made or intended to make donations to Al Qaeda.
Originally, the document is understood to have been seized by Bosnian police during searches of the offices of Benevolence International Foundation in Sarajevo in March 2002.
The list was first mentioned in the Indictment of Enaam Arnaout on 9 October, 2002 (02 CR 892) and was subsequently presented by the US government as Exhibit 5 in the Department of Justice "Government's Evidentiary Proffer Supporting the Admissibility of Co-conspirator Statements" in the case of USA v. Arnaout (USDC, Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division) filed on 29 January, 2003. The Evidentiary Proffer was subsequently ruled inadmissible.
Two recent judgments in the High Court of England have raised major questions about the provenance and meaning of the list:
It is unclear as to whether it is a list or donors or a list of those who might be approached for funding; there is nothing in the list to suggest that the individuals have made donations, rather than that they are potential donors.
It is unclear who created the document or when it came into existence; its author is unknown as is the source of the author's information.
The list has been dated by Mr.Brisard to 1988 at which time Osama Bin Laden was engaged in resisting the Soviet incursions into Afghanistan with the approval of Western governments. (The plaintiffs in the Burnett suit plead that "at least since August 1996, Osama Bin Laden has been named as a financier and promoter of Islamic extreme terrorist activities…")
There is nothing to link the list to Al Qaeda.
In 1988, the year of origin accorded by Mr. Brisard to the list, Khalid Bin Mahfouz was approached for a contribution to the Afghan resistance movement by his close friend, Salem Bin Laden, Osama Bin Laden's eldest brother. In line with many other prominent Saudi Arabians and in accordance with US Government foreign policy at that time, Khalid recalls making a donation of approximately $270,000 at some point before Salem's death in a plane crash in May 1988.
When this donation was put forward by the defendants in Al Rajhi Banking v. Wall Street Journal, the Court ruled that "this does not demonstrate or provide reasonable grounds to suspect funding of Osama Bin Laden or Al Qaeda."
On 18 January 2005 the Opinion and Order of the United States District Court Southern District of New York relating to Burnett Plaintiffs v. Mohammed Bin Abdullah Al-Jomaith stated: "Their (the Plaintiffs) theory of jurisdiction rests almost entirely on a document with serious foundational flaws. Even assuming, as the Court must, that the 'Golden Chain' refers to Mr. Aljomiah, with no indication of who wrote the list, when it was written, or for what purpose, the Court cannot make the logical leap that the document is a list of early al Qaeda supporters." In the same Opinion in the case of Burnett Plaintiffs v. Sheikh Hamad Al-Husani, the court stated that the Golden Chain is "only a list of names found in a charity's office." Motion to dismiss the Burnett complaint was granted in both cases.
Khalid Bin Mahfouz never knowingly made any donation to Al Qaeda or to any organization or person acting on Al Qaeda's behalf or to any other terrorist organisation.
See:
Al Rajhi Banking Investment Corporation v The Wall Street Journal Europe