U.S. slaps sanctions on two with links to Al Qaeda

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The United States has imposed new sanctions on a close associate of Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda network who helped smuggle foreign fighters into Iraq and a German jailed for plotting to bomb American military personnel in Germany.

The Treasury Department said it is freezing the assets in U.S. jurisdictions of Ahmad Khalaf Shabib Dulaymi for allegedly supporting the Al Qaeda organization, including acting as an intermediary between Al Qaeda members and its leaders close to bin Laden.

According to the Treasury, he also supported Al Qaeda by assisting in the flow of foreign fighters into Iraq and recruited people to smuggle money and weapons into Iraq from Syria. Dulaymi is suspected of managing two cells, including one in Romania that provided financing to the terrorists by smuggling cigarettes and coffee.

In addition, the U.S. has frozen the assets of German national Atilla Selek, who was convicted in Germany last month in connection with plots to bomb U.S. military installations and other sites in Germany.

The Treasury Department said he is a member of the Islamic Jihad Union, and he traveled to Pakistan in July 2006 to receive training in an IJU camp there.

In December 2008, he was charged in Germany with being a member of a terror organization and preparing a crime using explosives. He was sentenced to five years in prison.

-- Associated Press