ISIS making millions daily off crime, terror
26 Oct 2014 4:42 AM IST
The Islamic State has fast become one of the world’s wealthiest terror groups, generating tens of millions of dollars a month from black market oil sales, ransoms and extortion, officials said on Thursday. It earns $1 million a day alone by selling crude oil from fields captured when the group swept across Iraq and Syria earlier this year, said David Cohen, treasury undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence.
Because the group, also known as ISIS, has ‘amassed wealth at an unprecedented pace’ from different sources than most terror groups, it presents a particular challenge to the US working to choke off money flows. Unlike al-Qaida, IS does not attract most of its funds from deep-pocketed rich donors, often in Gulf countries, or from state sponsors. Yet ‘with the important exception of some state-sponsored terrorist organizations, ISIS is probably the best-funded terrorist organization we have confronted,’ Cohen said. Cohen vowed the US would hit hard against those found buying illegal oil and sanctions would follow.
Because the group, also known as ISIS, has ‘amassed wealth at an unprecedented pace’ from different sources than most terror groups, it presents a particular challenge to the US working to choke off money flows. Unlike al-Qaida, IS does not attract most of its funds from deep-pocketed rich donors, often in Gulf countries, or from state sponsors. Yet ‘with the important exception of some state-sponsored terrorist organizations, ISIS is probably the best-funded terrorist organization we have confronted,’ Cohen said. Cohen vowed the US would hit hard against those found buying illegal oil and sanctions would follow.
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