Just a phone call away
U.S. officials pay out millions to tipsters for help finding terrorists
Still, reward offers can snare some al Qaeda targets. The most recent payoff--$1 million--went four months ago to three informants who led Philippine authorities to Hamsiraji Marusi Sali, the No. 3 man in Abu Sayyaf, a key al Qaeda affiliate. Sali, who was wanted for kidnapping three Americans and was accused of involvement in the deaths of two of them, was killed in a shootout with Philippine soldiers. Another well-publicized success was the capture of Ramzi Yousef, one of the 1993 World Trade Center bombers, who was fingered in 1995 by an informant looking for the reward money.
Risk and reward. Today, the State Department is offering rewards for nearly 50 fugitives, including a dozen targets in Iraq. To receive money, an informant must help find someone who was involved in a terrorist act or is currently plotting one. But U.S. officials insist that they cannot guarantee any money in advance. "We don't promise anyone anything other than an assessment of the information and its value," says Taylor. An interagency committee including the FBI and others makes the final decision on whether--and how much--to pay, based in part on how risky it was for the informant to come forward.
U.S. officials are trying to raise the program's profile and, in particular, convince potential tipsters that the rewards are genuine. That is proving to be difficult, in part because the informants never attest publicly to their payoff because of their guaranteed anonymity. State Department officials say most of the 43 people who have received rewards in the program's history have been sent the money electronically once they have resettled, usually outside their home countries. But there have also been a few cases where diplomatic security agents had to fly abroad to deliver suitcases of cash in person to informants. U.S. officials have also helped informants in some cases to relocate if their lives are threatened. "We work to make sure they can enjoy the benefits of their rewards," says Taylor. A few of the tipsters have ended up in the United States, but most choose to remain abroad--in part because those who come to America must pay taxes as high as 60 percent on the reward money. "If they go to the Riviera, they don't get taxed at all," notes one State Department official.
Marketing the program in remote places like Afghanistan, where bin Laden is believed to be hiding, has been particularly challenging. The State Department has been tweaking its radio and print advertisements about the rewards to emphasize the Muslim lives lost in most of al Qaeda's attacks. Still, the most effective way of spreading the word in a part of the world where just about everybody smokes has been distributing matchbooks with photos of bin Laden and other fugitives.
But officials concede that sheepherders in Afghanistan often don't understand the value of $25 million, and they are looking into offering other forms of compensation. For his part, bin Laden, citing authority from the Koran, promises his followers who die in attacks on westerners a stable of virgins. Counters one official, "We can't come up with 70 virgins, but we can come up with goats."
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