M A I N   N E W S

How the FBI allowed Osama’s kin to flee US after 9/11
Ashish Kumar Sen writes from Washington

The Federal Bureau of Investigation actively assisted wealthy Saudis, including relatives of Osama bin Laden, to flee the USA soon after the September 11, 2001, attacks.

The Saudis feared for their well-being following reports that 15 of the 19 hijackers that flew planes into the World Trade Center in New York, the Pentagon on the outskirts of Washington, and a field in Pennsylvania, were Saudi nationals.

While the attacks prompted a shutdown of American airspace, 160 Saudis were the only ones airborne, their destination: safety, Saudi Arabia.

Newly released Federal Bureau of Investigation documents detail the flight of the Saudis out of Las Vegas and Providence, Rhode Island, and the assistance provided by the bureau to facilitate this getaway.

The U.S. government started reopening American airspace on September 13, 2001, but many flights remained grounded for days afterward.

The F.B.I. provided personal airport escorts to two prominent Saudi families who fled the United States, and several other Saudis were allowed to leave the country without first being interviewed, the documents show.

The documents reveal the Saudis were subject to only cursory questioning by F.B.I. agents. Experienced investigators suggest detailed counterterrorism interviews would have taken a minimum of two hours per passenger. There is no evidence offered that any such efforts were made by the F.B.I.

F.B.I. officials vehemently dismissed suggestions made in an October 2003 article in Vanity Fair magazine that the bureau had provided preferential treatment to the Saudis. “I say baloney to any inference we red-carpeted any of this entourage,” an F.B.I. official said in a 2003 internal note.

The documents were made public following a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against the Justice Department by Judicial Watch, a public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption.

The report contains many redactions that the Justice Department claims were made in the interests of privacy of the Saudi subjects identified in the documents. Additional redactions are claimed for law enforcement investigative purposes even though the report claims that “no information of investigative value” was learned from interviews of Bin Laden family members and Saudi royals.

The report is silent as to whether White House officials approved any of the flights. In June 2004 Judicial Watch provided the 9/11 Commission with previously unreported documents from U.S. Customs and Border Protection showing that 160 Saudis were allowed to leave on 55 commercial flights from airports around the country between September 11 and September 15, 2001.

Debate on the issue peaked after filmmaker Michael Moore investigated the flight of the Saudis in his film “Fahrenheit 9/11.” Author Craig Unger raises similar issues in his book “House of Bush/House of Saud,” which examines the mutually beneficial relationship between the Saudi royals and the family of President George W. Bush.

White House officials denied any special treatment for the Saudis. The 9/11 Commission, set up to examine intelligence failures that led to the September 11 attacks, also determined that there was no evidence of “political intervention” by the White House and that the F.B.I. had done a “satisfactory screening” of the departing Saudis to ensure they did not have information relevant to the attacks.

“Although the F.B.I. took all possible steps to prevent any individuals who were involved in or had knowledge of the 9/11/2001 attacks from leaving the U.S. before they could be interviewed,” a 2003 memo said, “it is not possible to state conclusively that no such individuals left the U.S. without F.B.I. knowledge.”

Critics say the newly released documents raise more questions than they answer.

“The F.B.I.’s heavily redacted Saudi flight report is self-serving and raises more questions than it answers. The report shows a lackadaisical investigation. It looks like the F.B.I. dropped the ball,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.