Recently have been re-reading the articles about Bob Ney (R-OH) being invited to London by lobbyists for a Cyprus-registered company, FN Aviation, later known as FAZ Aviation, that wanted a license to sell US plane parts to Iran. The lobbyists who arranged for Ney to go to London to discuss the proposal were Roy C. Coffee, a former aide and deputy campaign manager to one governor George W. Bush, and David diStefano, former chief of staff to Ney. Coffee and diStefano have recently been hired by Harriet Miers' old Dallas law firm, Locke Liddell & Sapp, which opened a lobbying outfit in DC last October. (Coffee's letter about how he found Ney and Nigel Winfield is quite interesting). But that's not what got my attention. It's the guy who owns FAZ Aviation, Fouad al Zayat, one of the top dozen high stakes gamblers in the world, along with Adnan Khashoggi of Iran Contra fame, etc. Al Zayat is Syrian born, resident of Cyprus, holds a Portuguese passport, and gambled in London's Ritz casino some 156 times between 1999 and 2001, losing nearly 10 million pounds. How did al Zayat make his fortune? You know, the usual. As the Sunday Times (UK) diplomatically put it when al Zayat's Rolls Royce and personal Boeing 727 were seized in 2002 after he bounced some 2 million pounds in checks at the Ritz casino, "Zayat built his fortune on a string of lucrative deals. Former business partners say he has acted as an intermediary in a series of contracts for the supply of defence-related equipment in Cyprus and the Middle East." For his part, Coffee says that Fouad Al Zayat was described to him by Winfield as the former Middle Eastern representative for Boeing for more than twenty years. If you Nexis al Zayat's companies, FN Aviation, later known as FAZ Aviation, you get a parent company, Samata Enterprises, with two parent companies, Lendinex Investments and Samaya Investments Ltd., both registered in Cyprus, Aqua Transit Ltd., previous name Aqua Gulf Transport....and others.

Lobbyist Roy Coffee insists the lobbying he did on behalf of FAZ Aviation was genuinely humanitarian in spirit. Their efforts were "to pursue a humanitarian exemption to the Iran-Syrian Sanctions Act for spare parts for civilian commercial aircraft. We were not attempting to make an end run around the sanctions act for military parts."

Coffee claims he had no idea that the FN/FAZ Aviation rep who hired him, Nigel Winfield, was a three time convicted felon who's been convicted of tax evasion and banned from race tracks across the East Coast for among other things alleged ties to the mob. He says he's not sure that would have stopped him from accepting the FN Aviation contract even if he had known because he so believed in the humanitarian mission FAZ was pursuing. All the paperwork was filed correctly, he insists, etc. etc.

Coffee doesn't address the strange fact that Ney beat 340 to 1 odds to win $34,000 while gambling with al Zayat at a London casino.

Coffee's piece is actually quite useful and interesting. It mentions a former fellow law student with Coffee, an Iranian American patent attorney now in Beverley Hills, that Coffee says he brought in to meet Ney and talk about opportunities for engagement with the Iranian people. Also this, "Through our contacts in the Administration, on the Hill and in the Diplomatic community, we were aware of behind the scenes meetings between officials of Iran and the US in the run up to and during the invasion of Afghanistan. Our understanding was the Iranians were being very helpful and there may be an opportunity for a breakthrough with the Bush Administration. However, in March the US invaded Iraq and the decision was made to shelve the plan until the war was over and conditions stabilized. By the summer of 2003, before we could revisit the issue, Foaud and Nigel broke their company up. It was during this time that we first learned of Nigel's criminal convictions for tax evasion in the mid 1980's." Hmmm. Why would what Coffee describes as a legitimate businessman (e.g. al Zayat, the alleged Boeing rep for the Mideast) be working with a convicted felon like Winfield? It's baffling. Also one notes again just the interesting fact that Ney lived in both Iran and Saudi Arabia, and while not serving on any of the foreign affairs committees, apparently was quite active on the sidelines on Iranian issues.

(*This post has been updated and revised).

Posted by Laura at March 6, 2006 06:04 PM