Repuglican Indited as Al Qaeda Supporter

From the Detroit Free Press comes this troubling (and buried) report of how much money talks:
Ex-Mich. congressman indicted in terrorist fund-raising conspiracy
By DAWSON BELL, January 16, 2008
FREE PRESS LANSING BUREAU
A former Republican congressman from west Michigan was indicted today on federal charges of money laundering, conspiracy and obstruction of justice in a scheme to assist a U.S.-based Islamic charity organization funnel money to Al Qaeda and Taliban-linked terrorists in Pakistan.
Mark Siljander, 56, also a former state legislator from St. Joseph County, was hired by the Islamic American Relief Agency in 2004 to assist in having the group removed from a U.S. Senate list of terrorist-linked charities, according to a statement released by the Department of Justice, then helping the group launder stolen federal funds with which to pay for his services.
Siljander is also accused of twice making false statements to federal agents investigating the case by claiming that he had not been hired to lobby and that his pay came from “charitable” donations intended to underwrite a book he was writing about bridging the gap between Islam and Christianity.
[...] The 42-count indictment also names as defendants five men connected to the Islamic American Relief Agency in Columbia, Mo. The agency closed in October 2004, the statement said.
The indictment charges IARA with sending approximately $130,000 to help Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, whom the United States has designated as a global terrorist. The money, sent to bank accounts in Peshawar, Pakistan in 2003 and 2004, was masked as donations to an orphanage located in buildings that Hekmatyar owned.
[...] The indictment “paints a troubling picture of an American charity organization that engaged in transactions for the benefit of terrorists and conspired with a former United States congressman to convert stolen federal funds into payments for his advocacy,” said Assistant Attorney General Kenneth Wainstein.
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080116/NEWS07/80116047/&imw