US anti-terrorist guidelines for charities
Regional-USA, Politics, 10/3/2006

The US Treasury Department issued voluntary guidelines for US-based charities to follow to avoid connections to terrorist individuals or organizations.

The guidelines, released September 29, detail steps charities can take to assure proper board governance, accounting practices and transparency to donors. The guidelines recommend checking overseas grantees and key employees against lists issued by several countries to designate terrorism connections.

Some Muslim advocates have said that previous actions taken by Treasury to designate Islamic charities as connected to terrorism have chilled charitable giving that normally spikes during Ramadan, a Muslim holy month that began September 23.

"Now people are just giving one-person-to-one-person," said Salam Al-Marayati, executive director of the Muslim Public Affairs Council, a public policy organization in Los Angeles. "You don't know who's giving to whom."

But Patrick M. O'Brien, Treasury's assistant secretary for terrorist financing, said that even though the guidelines were written for charities, individual donors concerned about where their money is going can use them and ask charities questions.

Saima Zaman, a program officer at GlobalGiving, said she understands that some Muslim Americans are worried about giving to charities, but that her organization makes it clear it follows US laws and shows donors specific projects their money will support – from distributing food for iftar (evening meals that break day-long Ramadan fasting) in Sudan to helping women widowed in the Pakistan earthquake.

While Treasury's guidelines were under review, the department took comments from the charitable sector. There were requests to withdraw the guidelines altogether, O'Brien said. "We considered that, but given the body of evidence out there, where over years (nongovernmental organizations) were used... wittingly or unwittingly by terrorist organizations, we have to participate in this space."

The new guidelines clarify certain terms used in guidelines that had been issued years earlier. For example, it uses the Internal Revenue Service's definition of "key employees" of a charity. Another change is the removal of language specifying that a charity's governing board should have at least three people.

Since September 2001, Treasury has designated 43 charities worldwide as supporters of terrorism. Under Executive Order 13224, the department freezes the assets of organizations so designated. Three of them --Benevolence International Foundation, Global Relief Fund, Holy Land Foundation -- had headquarters in the United States. Two, Al Haramain Foundation and Islamic African Relief Agency, had US branch offices.

Al-Marayati said that his organization has asked the government for a "white list" of charities that the government sees as free of any terrorist association and has been turned down.

But Farhana Khera, a lawyer with Muslim Advocates, a group of lawyers advising US charities, said it is "impractical" for the government to provide such a list, because a good institution can turn bad at any time. Khera said that her organization's members "don't want the government telling Muslims or any other faith which charities to support," based on first amendment concerns.

The Council of Foundations, one of the organizations that has requested the guidelines be withdrawn in favor of its alternate called "Principles of International Charity," will convene with several other organizations to give Treasury feedback on the revised guidelines. The meeting of foundations, charities, religious organizations and legal experts will include the Muslim Public Affairs Council and the Islamic Society of North America.

Khera said Treasury has been open to feedback and dialogue with the Muslim community, "but we need to keep pushing."

Previous Stories:
  UK arrests Islamic charity member   (5/25/2006)
  Senators call for investigating Muslim charities   (1/15/2004)
  Conference on burdens the Islamic charities suffer due to September 11 incidents   (1/2/2004)
  Threatened humanitarian and charity societies prepares for first conference   (1/4/2003)

Please add a link on your webiste pointing to ArabicNews.com and bookmark ArabicNews.com & subscribe to our daily email news bulletin.

Search