Tanzanite May Fund Terrorism

Dec. 14, 2001 -- The blue precious gem tanzanite is a hot item in shopping malls across America this holiday season, and if federal investigators are right, Osama bin Laden couldn't be happier.

"It's very clean, very bright and it does what a gemstone is supposed to do: excite people," said Cap Beesley, the president of American Gemological Laboratories.

When tanzanite was first sold to Americans more than 30 years ago, it was marketed as the most beautiful stone discovered in 2,000 years. Americans now buy about $300 million of tanzanite every year, making it the most popular colored gem after the sapphire.

But federal authorities and jewelry industry executives tell ABCNEWS some people in the tanzanite business may be using the gems to raise and move vast sums of money for bin Laden.

"There is no question that there is a connection to terrorism," Beesley said, agreeing further that there is a connection between tanzanite and al Qaeda, bin Laden's terror network.

The connection begins in the African nation of Tanzania, in the shadow of Mount Kilimanjaro. Investigators in the FBI and CIA trying to track bin Laden's money say for several years now his people have been buying up tanzanite in the small area of Tanzania where it is mined, something several miners confirmed for ABCNEWS. "I am not afraid to say that Osama has profit in the tanzanite, absolutely," said one miner.

Many of the biggest companies dealing in tanzanite said they were unaware of the allegations and the government of Tanzania flatly denies any ties to al Qaeda.

"There is no connection that has been established," said Mustafa Salim Nyang' Anyi, Tanzania's ambassador to the United States. "These are mere fabrications."

Diary Indicates Connection

But the bin Laden connection to tanzanite was well documented just this year at the trial of bin Laden's personal secretary, Wadih el Hage, who, according to his own diaries introduced in court, set up numerous businesses to deal in tanzanite.

"It was information that was a clarion call for the U.S. government to look very closely at this business," said former National Security Council official William Wechsler, who also chaired the NSC task force that investigated bin Laden's money during the Clinton administration. He says the tanzanite business is both highly profitable and an easy way to secretly move money around the world.

"A nugget, depending on its size, can be worth hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of dollars, and if you imagine moving that same amount in dollars — $5, $10, $20 bills — you'd have to get a steamer trunk to do it," says Wechsler. "That's the advantage of precious stones and tanzanite."

Tiffany's, the first to sell tanzanite in the late 1960s, has now quietly suspended its sales, as has the QVC shopping channel. Both cited concerns about a possible tanzanite connection to al Qaeda.

And a coalition of major jewelry associations — including the Jewelers of America, the American Gem Trade Association, the Jewelers Vigilance Committee, the American Gem Society, and Manufacturing Jewelers and Suppliers of America — issued a statement saying it was not aware of any terrorism link. If an al Qaeda connection is substantiated, the statement said, the industry will take appropriate measures.

But 80 percent of all tanzanite is shipped to the United States and some of the country's biggest retailers, while saying they are seeking more information, continue to sell it — even as U.S. authorities investigate the links between this beautiful blue gemstone and the al Qaeda network.