By Eric King-
Police are investigating claims that Britain’s biggest high street banks dabbled in a multi- billion dollar Russian money laundering operation.
The National Crime Agency and the Financial Conduct Authority have been drawn into the political scandal that has embroiled the HSBC, Barclays, and the Royal Bank of Scotland. The trio bank stand accused of handling more than 700 dollars in laundered money for Russian criminal gangs.
ALLEGATIONS
All three banks have denied the allegations and claimed to be actively against money laundering of all types. The H.S.B.C is accused of processing up to 545 million of criminal funds, according to documents passed to The Guardian by the organised Crime and Corruption reporting project – a U.S backed project.
SCANDAL
Former shadow business secretary has called the claims a ” huge and building scandal”. A full investigation has been called for by the Global Witness group, who are an anti – corruption campaign group.
SERIOUS
The allegations are serious and inflame the fire in the adage ‘ there is no smoke without fire”. The British government and the British people must hope the allegation to be false and unfounded, for it will be deeply embarrassing.
In 2012, HSBC paid a 1.9bn dollar settlement with the U.S authorities over money laundering charges and hired an independent monitor to preside over its efforts to be totally clean.In light of that existing system, it is deeply surprising and disappointing that an allegation of this magnitude can be made against H.S.B.C.
In a statement to the eye of media.com on Tuesday evening, the bank insisted it was “committed to fighting financial crime” and has ” systems and processes in place to identify suspicious activity and report it to the appropriate government authorities “.
A spokesperson from Barclays told the eye of media. com that ” Barclays Bank does not condone fraudulent conduct or money laundering activities, and have systems and procedures in place to counter money laundering and combat financial crime”.
If this is accurate, the roof of these false claims should soon be exposed. In the meantime, a dark cloud of suspicion hangs over the banks.