Associated Press

A U.S. Customs agent, left, mans the door of Amal Express yesterday in Minneapolis as U.S. Customs agents enter the office and shut the business down. Agents moved quickly yesterday to investigate several Minneapolis businesses, including the one shown here, after they were added by the Bush administration to a list of groups or people aiding terrorist activity.

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration carried out a series of raids yesterday on U.S. businesses suspected of helping to funnel millions of dollars to Osama bin Laden's terrorist network, arresting a Massachusetts man and seizing evidence in several cities.

Overseas, two Arab financiers were questioned by Swiss police cooperating with the United States.

"By shutting these networks down, we disrupt the murderers' work," said President Bush, announcing the first major crackdown on companies, organizations and people suspected of aiding terrorists who carried out the Sept. 11 attacks.

Law enforcement officials, speaking only on condition of anonymity, said investigators believe tens of millions of dollars a year flowed overseas through the al-Barakaat network, one of two organizations targeted by the day's law enforcement raids. These officials said much of the money consisted of funds that Somali residents were sending home to relatives, adding that they suspect a portion was skimmed for use by al-Qaida and other terrorist networks.

Customs agents, acting on an order signed by Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill, seized evidence at nine locations in four cities: Boston, Minneapolis, Seattle and Columbus, Ohio. Assets of nine organizations and two people in the United States were frozen.

In addition, evidence was seized at two storefronts in northern Virginia, officials said.

The United States also asked allies to freeze assets that aid bin Laden and his al-Qaida organization in at least nine countries. Some of them acted even before Bush announced the crackdown on the network suspected in the Sept. 11 attacks on Washington and New York.

In all, the names of 62 entities and people were added to a list of suspected terrorist associates targeted by Bush in an executive order signed last month. The earlier list included 88 groups or people whose assets had been frozen because of their ties to al-Qaida and other terrorist groups.

The new list covers groups and people affiliated with two suspected bin Laden financial networks - Al Taqua and Al-Barakaat. Material distributed by the White House said the two organizations maintain a presence in more than 40 nations, the United States among them. Bush said both "raise funds for al-Qaida."

Both are informal, largely unregulated financial networks - sometimes called hawalas - that authorities say funnel money to al-Qaida through companies and nonprofit organizations they operate.

Bush's statements were quickly rebutted by the chairman of the al-Barakaat group, speaking in Mogadishu, Somalia. "This is all lies," Ahmed Nur Ali Jim'ale told The Associated Press in a telephone interview from Dubai. "We are people who are hard working and have nothing to do with terrorists," said Jim'ale, who is on the administration's target list.

In Boston, Mohamed M. Hussein and Liban M. Hussein were charged with running an illegal money transmitting business, according to a criminal complaint. Officials said Mohamed Hussein was in custody, but the other man was not.

The two men ran Barakaat North America Inc. in Dorchester, Mass., a foreign money exchange, without a state license, according to a U.S. Customs Service affidavit. The business moved over $2 million through a U.S. bank from January through September, the government said.

Federal authorities in Columbus, Ohio, sealed off a money-transfer and check-cashing business on the administration target list. Barakaat Enterprise shares a small strip mall with a pizza shop and beauty salon, with private homes across the street.

A notice taped on the front window of the business said: "All property contained in this building is blocked pursuant to an executive order of the president on Sept. 23 of this year under the authority of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act."

In Seattle, more than a dozen U.S. Customs Service agents raided a building containing the offices of Barakat Wire Transfer Co. and detained one man.

Customs agents in blue windbreakers converged on a Minneapolis address shared by several businesses and a man, Garad Jama, suspected of aiding bin Laden's network.

The Al-Barakaat organization has ties in several countries, including the United States.

The order cites affiliated organizations in Minnesota, Massachusetts, Ohio and Washington state.

In addition, the United States moved to freeze the assets of two people with American residences, Liban Hussein of Dorchester and Jama of Minneapolis. Hussein also has a Canadian address.

The list targets assets in several countries, including Switzerland, Somalia, Liechtenstein, the Bahamas, Sweden, Canada, Austria, Italy and the United Arab Emirates. The administration is urging governments to freeze the assets in banks within their borders.

Swiss police briefly detained two Arab financiers allegedly linked to bin Laden's terrorist network and an Egyptian fundamentalist group. Youssef M. Nada and Ali Himmat questioned for several hours in Lugano, Switzerland, just across the border from their homes in Campione D'Italia.

Liechtenstein officials seized documents of a financial manager who represents Al Taqua in the country, said Lothar Hagen, spokesman for the national court, the highest judiciary in the Alpine principality of 32,000.