WASHINGTON: Dokhi Fassihian is passionate about Iran, and her resume reflects it. The policy analyst has written articles on Iran, helped with a book about the country and even worked there. So she was stunned when the Monster online service informed her recently that it would remove the word “Iran” from her resume to comply with US sanctions against that country.

“How can you be an Iran specialist and not have the word ‘Iran’ on your resume?” demanded Fassihian, 27, of Arlington, who immigrated to Virginia, USA, at age three and holds a master’s degree in international studies from Johns Hopkins University. “I’m an American. I’ve lived in this country all my life ... This is the first time I’m feeling discriminated against.”

The e-mail notices sent to Fassihian and thousands of other Monster customers provoked an uproar. The popular Internet career site quickly clarified that it intended to target resumes only from people living or job-hunting in the seven countries designated by US authorities as sponsors of terrorism, including Iran.

But Iranian-Americans are fighting to have the company drop the practice altogether. “What’s happening in this country after Sept 11 is a big shock,” said Fassihian, who works as a legislative analyst for the National Iranian-American Council here. “We have been grouped unfortunately in this category of potential terrorists.”

The controversy reflects a new concern rippling through Muslim and Arab-American communities, already on edge because of hate crimes and a law enforcement crackdown since the 2001 terror attacks. Now some Muslims say they fear that businesses are singling them out unfairly to comply with US anti-terrorism measures.

In recent weeks, national Muslim groups have expressed alarm about reports of Muslims in New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts and other states facing demands by banks and credit card companies for extra information — or finding their accounts closed without explanation. The customers had been asked to provide tax and banking records, residency documentation and proof of identity, the organizations said. And some immigrants say they have been distressed by extra questioning they have faced at money-transferring institutions.

National Muslim groups are trying to put together a registry of incidents to gauge the extent of the situation.

“We see evidence that the wolf has been in the neighbourhood, but we want to confirm it,” said Khurrum Wahid, legal adviser to one such group, the Council on American-Islamic Relations. “We want to see if this is truly a systemic problem or just one or two banks that might have gone about it the wrong way.”

US officials and business experts deny that new anti- terrorism regulations discriminate against Muslims or Arab- Americans. But they acknowledge that some customers could come under added scrutiny.

The USA. Patriot Act and other measures passed after the terrorist attacks increase the burden on financial institutions to know their customers and identify suspicious transactions. That’s particularly true for money-transfer companies, which were not as strictly regulated in the past.

“What the financial institutions are asked to do is to take responsibility for ensuring that (they) are not used to fund acts of terror,” said Taylor Griffin, a spokesman for the Treasury Department. The government, he said, “is not asking for discrimination, but vigilance.”

But there is some latitude in how companies carry out the requirements.

For example, businesses must assess whether customers’ money transfers could be linked to terrorist activities. Jorge Guerrero, president of the National Money Transmitters Association, said that if funds are sent to a country of concern to the US government, “you have to look at those transactions, and perhaps perform enhanced due diligence.”

The Council on American-Islamic Relations recently took up the case of a New Yorker named Muhammad Ali, who had tried to send $80 to his brother in Connecticut from a Western Union office in Brooklyn. The company’s main office subsequently called Ali, an African-American, and told him his order would be blocked until he provided more identification.

The problem: Ali’s name — common among Muslims — had turned up on a 103-page list of suspected terrorists, drug traffickers and others maintained by the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Asset Control. The list isn’t new; for years, major financial institutions have been obliged to make sure their customers weren’t on it. But since the attacks, hundreds of new names have been added to it, and more companies are checking it.

Ali eventually provided identification, and the money was sent. A Western Union spokeswoman, Wendy Carver-Herbert, said the company was sensitive to concerns raised by Ali and the Muslim group but couldn’t change its policies.

“We are often in a difficult position of trying to balance the needs of our customers while also ensuring that we are following the laws,” Carver-Herbert said.

Muslim groups are concerned that more cases of mistaken identity will occur, especially as the Patriot Act extends money laundering regulations to new kinds of businesses, such as life insurance companies and even gem dealers.

“How do you protect innocent people from, every single time they want to do business, this thing coming up?” Wahid asked. US authorities, he added, “are really not going to be finding a terrorist using their own name to send $80 if they’re on a public list.”

US authorities hope the new regulations will better detect suspicious patterns. —Dawn/LAT-WP News Service (c) The Washington Post