US Drops Three Pakistan-Linked Men From Sanctions List After 20 Years

WASHINGTON, DC-The United States has formally published the removal of three Pakistan-linked men from its sanctions list, more than two decades after they were designated in cases involving terrorism and narcotics trafficking, according to US Treasury Department records.

The three are Mohammed Tufail, Sher Afghan and Nasir Ali Khan.

The removals were made by the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control on July 27 as part of a broader effort to modernize its sanctions lists. They were formally published in the Federal Register on October 7.

The Treasury Department said the July action removed 84 individuals and entities and updated other entries as part of an effort to keep US sanctions targeted, effective and current. Those removed included individuals and entities no longer considered US national-security or foreign-policy priorities, including some deceased people, defunct entities and targets sanctioned more than 20 years ago.

Treasury did not publicly specify which rationale applied to each of the three Pakistan-linked individuals.

Tufail, also identified as S M Tufail and Sheik Mohammed Tufail, had been designated under US terrorism sanctions. When his assets were blocked in December 2001, the Treasury Department identified him as an industrialist and one of three key directors of Ummah Tameer-e-Nau, or UTN, an organization founded by Pakistani nuclear scientists.

Treasury said at the time that UTN directors and members had met Osama bin Laden, al-Qaeda leaders and Taliban leader Mullah Omar and discussed the development of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons.

The other two men had been designated under US narcotics sanctions.

Sher Afghan, who was born in Pakistan, was added to the sanctions list in June 2001 under the US Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act.

Nasir Ali Khan, born in Pakistan in 1955, was also placed under narcotics sanctions in June 2001.

A US State Department report covering Pakistan’s counter-narcotics efforts in 1996 said the country’s caretaker government had arrested a major trafficker named Nasir Ali Khan, who was wanted in the United States on drug charges. The report also said an American extradition request was pending.

The available records do not establish why each of the three men was removed from the sanctions list in July.

OFAC said its broader sanctions-modernization exercise was intended to remove outdated entries and improve the accuracy of its lists while ensuring that removals did not undermine US national-security or foreign-policy interests. (IANS)