Poland Withdraws License of Firm Linked to Abu Nidal Terrorists

The Polish government acknowledged Tuesday that it has withdrawn the business license of an international trading company that a U.S. State Department document has linked to a Palestinian terrorist group.

Government spokesman Jerzy Urban said that the firm, SAS International Trading and Investments, has closed its headquarters in a downtown office building and that office director Samir Hassan Najmeddin, left Poland Jan. 14.

“He was not expelled,” Urban said. “He simply left after closing his business and his apartment.” He said a Najmeddin associate left the country earlier this month.

In a classified intelligence document that came to light in Washington in July, SAS International Trading was described as an important financial center for the terrorist network of Abu Nidal. The report claimed that the company traded commercial goods and arms to raise funds to finance terrorist actions. The United States reportedly had been pressing Poland to force the two Palestinians to leave.

While not directly acknowledging the accusation, Urban said: “To close a company is not a court procedure. When Polish authorities come to the conclusion that a business does not appear to be in the interests of the country, the license is simply withdrawn.

“The American authorities have not provided the Polish side with any proofs of such (terrorist) connections,” Urban said. But, he added, “Poland is firmly against any forms of terrorism.”

American Response

In Washington, State Department spokesman Charles Redman said the United States “is pleased that they announced that departure, and we hope this represents a commitment on the part of the government of Poland to dissociate itself from terrorism.”

Reports in an underground publication of the banned Solidarity trade union said in September that the five-year-old SAS International Trading firm was trading in weapons manufactured in Poland, including Kalashnikov assault rifles, pistols, machine guns, and portable anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons. Among the company’s customers, the publication said, was Libya, which reportedly bought 4,000 Kalashnikovs in 1984 for $500,000.

Abu Nidal is the code name of Palestinian terrorist Sabri Banna, whose group broke from the Palestine Liberation Organization in 1973. It has been blamed for the airport attacks in Rome and Vienna in 1985, in which 20 people were killed.

Abu Nidal, according to the underground publication, visited Warsaw in December, 1983, for a board meeting of the trading company, and came again in September, 1984.