Bin Laden company denies ties to Osama

[maseman]

Source: MSNBC/AP

NEW YORK - The Saudi Binladin Group is not liable for the Sept. 11 attacks, attorneys for the multinational engineering firm claim, because it made Osama bin Laden surrender his stake in the company 14 years ago.

Responding in federal court to lawsuits over the attacks, the lawyers wrote that in 1993, the terrorist mastermind was forced out as a shareholder in two companies his family owns.

(snip)

In the Friday filing, lawyers for Saudi Binladin Group said Bakr Binladin publicly renounced Osama bin Laden in a statement released to the media in February 1994. Two months later, the Saudi government revoked Osama bin Laden's citizenship and froze his assets, the lawyers noted.

Read more: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20575830/

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This is a weird story. I don't know about you, but I would consider possibly changing the name of my company with such a bad conotation. It would be like having an engineering firm called Hitler, Goebbels and Partners.

[ret5hd]

1. They could change to Bush Bush Ladin & Rice, LLC

[Bolo Boffin]

2. The company was named after Osama's father

Who had several wives and many children. It's a huge corporation. They probably feel that they own the name more than Osama does, since he's been frozen out and repudiated.

If they ever did work in the United States again, they probably would put up a front organization. Osama really had diluted that brand name here, hasn't he?

[maseman]

3. In the world of marketing

this one would be tough to re-brand the bin Ladin image.

[MetaTrope]

4. Just because they publicly disowned him doesn't mean they don't have his number on speed dial

Right, Karl Rove?

[Bolo Boffin]

5. Oh, I understand he still talks to his mom, and probably a couple of others.

But his father did divorce his mother way back in Osama's childhood. It didn't negate his part in the company, or revoke parental rights, but Osama isn't as close to the extended bin Laden family as you might think.

[HamdenRice]

6. Do you have any evidence of this whatsoever?

Or are you just making stuff up again? Just how do you know that bin Laden is not as close to his family "as we might think." Have you been listening in to their phone conversations? Been to the bin Laden family reunions?

This is pure speculation. The point of the article, as I point out down thread, is that well informed and well connected people think the bin Laden company financed al Qaeda, and hence terrorism.

Please refrain from posting pure speculation drawn from nothing at all, as fact.

[HamdenRice]

7. The headline is misleading. Well connected plaintiffs accused company of financing OBL

This is one of those weird stories in which the denial is printed without clearly explaining the accusation.

The key paragraph is actually the third:

"The company filed the defense papers late Friday in U.S. District Court in answer to claims brought by representatives, survivors and insurance carriers of the victims. The plaintiffs, who seek billions of dollars in damages, allege the Saudi Binladin Group, along with numerous banks, charities and individuals worldwide, provided material support and assistance to al-Qaida prior to the attacks.

The plaintiffs contend Bakr bin Laden — Osama bin Laden's brother, the senior member of the bin Laden family and chairman of Saudi Binladin Group — was one of al-Qaida's principal financiers."

Insurance companies don't file frivolous lawsuits because, among other reasons, of the costs of counsel, and many of them have "intelligence" departments. This allegation is quite significant.