(Page 19 of 22) - Terrorist Financing and Government Response in East Africa authored by Piombo, Jessica.

(or unwillingness) to tighten security and enforce border controls. The countries that do
have anti-money laundering legislation are slow to implement the regulations, for reasons
discussed below, and the entire effort against money laundering and other forms of TF
involves more than just the creation of AML regimes. Enforcement is also key.

Therefore strengthening law enforcement capacities could help area governments

uncover and then successfully prosecute money-launderers and other terrorist financiers.
For example, seminars organized by the Department of Justice’s Office of Overseas
Prosecutorial Development Assistance and Training (OPDAT) provide training to help
participating countries to develop action plans to strengthen counterterrorism efforts and
draft counterterrorism legislation. Djibouti, Kenya and Tanzania have sent
representatives to receive training in combating terrorist financing from OPDAT. Since
capacity and enforcement abilities to combat TF in these countries is particularly low (see
below), there should be indirect benefit to the efforts of these countries to combat TF.

III.

Conclusion

The nature of terrorist finance in East Africa is not very well known, though the

the terrorist threat seems widespread throughout the region. Provisions to combat TF are
slowly being put in place, but the record to date in both the creation of legislation to fight
TF and the enforcement of the legislation that does exist is not very encouraging.

Effective anti-TF regimes are not likely to be constructed until some of the more

pressing issues facing area governments are addressed. Classic development aid,
therefore, should not be sacrificed to the current obsession with the war on terror. Reports
continually stress how US military agencies are taking over the military side of the war
on terror in these regions: based from Camp Lemonier in Djibouti, US and allied forces
launch surveillance missions, hunt Al-Qaeda operatives, and attempt to monitor overland
and sea-bound trade to prevent smuggling of operatives, weapons, and other resources of
local terrorist groups.

African governments, which from the end of the Cold War to the

initiation of the War on Terror had been relatively neglected by US assistance, are
basking in the new attention and will accept whatever assistance the US government will
supply. Their own commitment to the US priorities, however, has been neither strong nor
convincing.

Anti-TF measures, especially those involved in establishing genuine AML

regimes, will come only when rulers no longer rely on patronage bases that could be
harmed if strong AML regimes are implemented. The AML regimes, even if enacted in a
comprehensive manner, will not be effective until capacity issues are addressed.
Therefore, current policies that address other aspects of the war on terror, and which are
not specifically addressed towards the TF issue, should work to resolve some of the
issues that prevent the effective implementation of AML regimes and other measures to
combat terrorist finance.

The overall situation and outlook is mixed. There is potential for improvement,

but many factors that could work to keep this region an area of concern for the US in the
war on terror. The factors that make terrorist finance difficult to track, monitor, and
control are pervasive and not easily resolvable, and they mandate that policies take a
comprehensive approach, not solely focused on either terrorist finance or the GWOT. The

See, for example, Tom Duhs, “The War on Terror in the Horn of Africa,” Marine Corps Gazette 88, no.4

(April 2004), 54-60.