SAfrica asks UN to delay putting two on Qaeda list

JOHANNESBURG, Jan 24 (Reuters) South Africa said today it had asked the United Nations to delay placing two South Africans on its list of suspects linked to al Qaeda, as US authorities pushed for the move.

Foreign ministry spokesman Ronnie Mamoepa said the request amounted to an objection by the South African government, which wants talks with the United States over its allegations Junaid Docrat and Farhad Docrat finance and recruit for al Qaeda.

The United States has submitted papers to the UN Security Council seeking to put the two cousins on its list of people with ties to al Qaeda and the toppled Taliban.

The move would require South Africa to freeze their bank accounts and ban them from travelling.

South Africa's Deputy Foreign Minister Aziz Pahad said his country was exercising its right to question the proposals but that it was not soft on fighting terrorism.

''We want to be sure that anybody who gets onto this (UN) list gets onto the list for very good reasons,'' he told a news conference in the South African capital Pretoria.

US LIST ANYWAY But he said Washington had notified his government that it would put the Docrats on its own list irrespective of any UN decision, an action he said ''will have very serious consequences anyway''.

Junaid, a Johannesburg dentist, and Farhad, a cleric who lives near Pretoria, have denied the allegations by Washington, which says al Qaeda operatives are in Somalia, Sudan and North Africa, while fundraising and recruiting have become a serious worry in South Africa, Nigeria and the trans-Sahara region.

Their lawyer, Shaheed Dollie, has asked the United States for evidence backing its allegations.

Under UN procedures, the Security Council committee in charge of adding names to the list allows members a ''silence period'' in which to raise objections to any proposed listing.

South Africa's objection may not derail the process.

Diplomats said objections are rare because the country seeking the listing has to submit a detailed statement outlining the case, and normally tries to iron out any potential problems before the start of the ''silence period''.

If an agreement is worked out in Washington's favour, the Docrat names could become final on the list on Friday.

The South African Communist Party, a key ally of the ruling ANC, said Washington did not have a shred of evidence.

''The SACP wishes to remind the (President George W) Bush administration that South Africa is a sovereign, constitutional state governed by the well known principle of innocence until proven otherwise through a credible and legitimate due process of law,'' it said in a statement on the SAPA news agency.

Junaid's father Ismail said he believed he was suspected because of his ''harmless'' ties to Zubair Ismail and Feroz Ganchi, who were arrested in Pakistan in 2004 and then released.

The pair were caught with senior al Qaeda operative Ahmed Ghailani, a Tanzanian indicted for his alleged role in the 1998 attacks on US embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam.

REUTERS SSC VV1920