ARGENTINA/BRAZIL: The Triple Frontier is a lawless area, writes Séamus Mirodan, in Ciudad del Este, but has it become a magnet for terrorists?
Situated between Argentina and Brazil, the sprawling Iguazu waterfalls are among the most popular tourist destinations in South America, with nearly 2 million visitors flocking annually to witness their extravagant beauty.
However, in the shadow of the Iguazu lies the Triple Frontier, where the borders of Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay meet. It is a lawless zone which the US has labelled as a magnet for Islamic terrorists, despite constant claims to the contrary by local residents.
Known for many years as a hotbed for illegal arms dealing, drug-trafficking and counterfeiting, the Triple Frontier has recently been described by US sources as equivalent to the world's new Libya, a place where terrorists with widely disparate ideologies, including Marxist Colombian rebels, American white supremacists, Hamas, Hizbullah and others, meet to swap tradecraft.
As dawn breaks over the city of Ciudad del Este, on the Paraguayan side of the frontier, the streets erupt in frenzied activity. Over a thousand market stalls spring to life offering counterfeit every- thing from Rolexes and designer sun- glasses to cameras and computers. 14 official and 30 "unofficial" change houses open their doors and begin trading millions of dollars worth of currency, as countless more money-changers patrol the streets looking for business.
At the city limit, motorbike taxis weave dangerously between four lanes of all but stationary traffic, ferrying passengers across the Friendship Bridge which leads to the Brazilian city of Foz de Iguazu. For those travelling by car, the 200-metre journey can turn into a three- hour ordeal as up to 700,000 vehicles a day attempt to crawl from one side to another.
There is no passport control and only a minimal amount of vehicle inspection. This, combined with Paraguay's status as a tax-free zone, offers a unique commercial opportunity attracting millions of dollars worth of both legal and illegal trade.
Three years ago, according to Forbes magazine, Ciudad del Este was the third-largest financial centre in the world, behind Hong Kong and Miami. The local Arab population says it is this valuable trade and other local resources which are the true object of the negative attention drawn from foreign interests.
Sheik Taleb Jomha, religious leader of the Muslim community in Foz do Iguazu, says: "This community has no connection with any kind of terrorism. I think there may be a commercial reason behind these allegations. The Triple Border represents the principle commercial hub of the Mercosur and maybe there are people who want to destroy tourist activity here."
Said Mohamed Taigen, secretary to the Ciudad del Este Chamber of Commerce, says: "The strategic interest here is fresh drinking water. The Triple Frontier is right above the richest part of the Aquifer Guarani, the largest source of drinking water in the world. A piece of theatre is being played out on this stage," he adds, "intended to lead to the intervention of outside forces."
A US Library of Congress report produced in July 2003 spoke of terrorist training camps and sleeper cells in the area. However, when Coffer Black, the US counter-terrorism chief, attended a meeting of Mercosur - a trade bloc comprising Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay - that December, he signed a joint statement declaring that "no terrorist cells, whether active or dormant", existed in the region. Accord- ing to local newspaper reports, he even went as far as to say: "I'm going to send my son here on his honeymoon."
Argentina's counter-terrorism chief, Koby Larz, was more sceptical, but agrees. "There is no evidence of any kind of terrorist groups actually operating in the zone. What does occur is fund-raising for terrorist organisations. Some richer members of the Arab community compete every month to see who can donate more to 'The poor orphans of Lebanon' and it appears much of this money is siphoned off to groups such as Hizbullah."
For the nexus of these operations, Larz pointed to the Shia Prophet Mohammed mosque in Ciudad del Este.
"Those who attend there are all either current or former members of Hizbullah," he says, "and it is from here and the 20-storey building which rises above the mosque that funds are sent to Lebanese terrorists."
Interpol's chief of intellectual property fraud, John Newton, added weight to these claims this week when he told a press conference in Brazil that in the Triple Border zone, "there are traders of Middle Eastern origin who from time to time recycle some of their assets and donate them to some of these [ terrorist] organisations".
Brazilian congressman Julio Lopez, also at the conference, agreed: "We also have evidence that al-Qaeda could be involved in the contraband manufacture of cigarettes destined for Brazil." The following day, former Argentine president Eduardo Duhalde pointed to Colombian intelligence which suggests that the FARC has managed to "perforate organisations in Argentina".
Newton also referred to loyalist para- militaries from Northern Ireland saying they were involved in the regional trade in vodka, pirated CDs and DVDs.