Homeland Security

MR. BOUCHER: Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. If I can, at the top I would like to mention that the United States has designated and blocked the assets of two individuals linked to the terrorist organization Jemaa Islamiyah under our Executive Orders. The two are Nurjaman Riduan Ismuddin -- commonly known as Hambali -- and Mohamad Iqbal Abdurrahman -- commonly known as Abu Jibril. Both have close ties to al-Qaida and I will give you much more information in writing after this about these individuals as well as the legal authorities that were used to block their assets.

QUESTION: Do you know if they have assets in this country?

MR. BOUCHER: I do not think I have that information.

QUESTION: Is this (inaudible) that produces the Joint Treasury-State list?

MR. BOUCHER: Yes -- and then we have also asked the UN Sanctions Committee to add these individuals to his list.

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QUESTION: Yeah, a trade -- a trade organization representing major US companies, Boeing and Caterpillar is holding a briefing today. They're complaining about visa processing. They say the back load of about 25,000 visa applications is really hurting their business, their ability to get people into the country. Anything you can say about that?

MR. BOUCHER: I do not have anything new to say today. We are certainly aware of the concerns of US business, US universities, exchange programs, various others, as well as foreign travelers about the fact that visa processing now takes more time.

Our first responsibility and I think the President's first responsibility, is keep this country safe. We needed to have added additional security requirements. We have added additional processes so that we can check names against -- I think, what is now one of the most sophisticated databases in the world so that we can make sure the right people get in and are safe with us and the wrong people do not get in.

That is a process that we will try to make as efficient as possible. I think we have, in fact, improved it in recent months. We have found ways to do this more efficiently, but the fundamental that we need to do additional security checks now that we did not do as extensively, that we were not able to check as extensively before September 11th, that fact remains. We will do what we can to make it efficient -- we have do it -- we have to make sure security is respected.

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