"... al Qaeda is broke, but the Taliban is flush ..."

In the CABLE/ here

The good news about U.S. efforts to combat terrorist financing is that "al Qaeda core," the senior leadership of the organization, is so low on funds that its affiliates are forced to look outside the network to fund their activities.

The bad news is that the Taliban has plenty of money. And the European decision not to share some financial data is hurting America's ability to go after the funds, the U.S. Treasury Department's assistant secretary for terrorist financing, David Cohen, told a crowd at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy Wednesday.

Al Qaeda is "in the worst financial shape it has been in for years," ....... "unlike al Qaeda, the Taliban is not experiencing much financial stress," he added, explaining that the Taliban has plenty of money to conduct terrorist attacks, train and recruit soldiers, and fight against U.S. troops.

"The Taliban still has the funding necessary to fundamentally challenge our core national security objective of bringing peace and stability to Afghanistan," said Cohen. Europe is being unhelpful on two fronts, Cohen complained. First of all, U.N. Security Council 1267, which is aimed directly at al Qaeda and the Taliban, "has come under attack, particularly in Europe," ......"