(I just KNEW there was a terrorist connection in Mexico.....the beheadings, violence and drug trade. How many terrorists and their terrible weapons have been smuggled across our border?)

Bush adds 7 foreigners, groups to kingpin list

Bush adds 7 foreigners, groups to kingpin list
May 30, 2008 - 5:20pm

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Bush administration on Friday named four foreigners and three organizations abroad, including a Kurdish rebel group, to a list of suspected drug traffickers, including those who trade in drugs to help terrorists.

They will be sanctioned under the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act and will be denied access to the U.S. financial system and all trade and transactions involving U.S. companies and individuals.

The act, which became law in December 1999, targets significant foreign narcotics traffickers, their organizations and operatives worldwide. With this action, 75 individuals and groups have been named to the list.

The individuals added to the list were: Haji Asad Khan Zarkari Mohammadhasni of Afghanistan; Hermagoras Gonzalez Polanco of Venezuela; Cumhur Yakut of Turkey; and Marcos Arturo Beltran Leyva of Mexico.

The entities were: Beltran Leyva Organization of Mexico; the 'ndrangheta organized crime syndicate based in the southern Italian region of Calabria; and the PKK (KGK, Kongra-Gel, formerly Kurdistan Workers' Party), a Kurdish rebel group that has been fighting for self-rule in the mainly Kurdish areas of southeastern Turkey since 1984.

"Now that PKK has been designated under the kingpin act, the penalties for doing business with them are much higher," said Gordon Johndroe, a spokesman for the National Security Council. "We also now have the authority to target and designate other PKK entities and associates for narcotics activity. Before we were limited to this group's terror activities."


(Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)

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