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A visiting Saudi Arabian government delegation was summoned to a meeting with senior Canberra bureaucrats this month to discuss Australia's concerns about the kingdom's financing of terrorism.
The Saudi officials had been in Australia several days to meet Islamic community and business leaders before the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade learned of their whereabouts and arranged a meeting through the Saudi Arabian embassy.
A member of the delegation from the Ministry for Islamic Affairs and Endowment told The Weekend Australian it was here to sort out problems with the lucrative business of exporting halal meat to Saudi Arabia.
But members also met trustees raising $2.65million for the controversial purchase of a mosque in southwestern Sydney.
Supporters of hardline Islamic cleric Sheikh Abdul Salam Mohammed Zoud have bought the mosque and must raise the full amount before the July 30 settlement date.
Sheikh Zoud preaches at the prayer hall around the corner whose congregation has included Faheem Lodhi, who is in custody charged with committing an act in preparation for a terrorist attack.
One of the trustees, Ibaa Almajzoub, said the Saudis were interested in knowing if local fundraising efforts had been successful.
Mr Almajzoub said the Saudis had heard about the mosque purchase through Saudi newspaper articles and the internet. He said they told the Saudis all of the money had been raised locally through Islamic communities.
At the July 7 meeting, DFAT and Attorney-General's Department officials raised concerns about donations from Saudi Arabians reaching the hands of extremist or terrorist groups in Southeast Asia and Australia via charitable and religious welfare groups.
The US is concerned that Saudi funding to charities and some boarding schools in Indonesia has been siphoned off to fund the operations of terrorist groups such as al-Qa'ida and Jemaah Islamiah.
At the meeting, the Australian officials praised the Saudi Government for recent crackdowns on extremists within its own country.
Saudi ambassador Abdulaziz Al Wasil said DFAT initiated the meeting but he denied any specific concerns were raised about money from Saudi Arabia being given to extremist or terrorist groups in the region.
Instead, he said, recent Saudi initiatives to better "manage the flow of money" from Saudi public and private donors to groups offshore were explained to the officials.
"We have strict measures in place, probably more than any other country," he said.
Terrorism expert Rohan Gunaratna said governments had not worked hard enough to stop the "continuous flow of funds" to terrorists worldwide including Australia.
A DFAT spokeswoman de scribed the
meeting as involving "a constructive exchange".
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