WILL FINCEN SANCTION MALTA'S MAIN LEADING BANK ?

 

All of Malta has been in a uproar, in the aftermath of the disclosure that the country's disgraced former Prime Minister, Joseph Muscat, received "consultancy payments" from a Swiss shell company, paid by a mysterious Pakistani lawyer. Most observers have correctly concluded that the payments, which were obviously structured to conceal their true nature, were part of a corrupt arrangement between Muscat and a foreign company that concluded an extremely favourable arrangement with Malta in a major transaction.

The suspicious nature of the payments, and the PEP status of the recipient, newly out of office, and who flatly denied receiving any money when queried by the press, on camera, all add up to one more episode of compliance malpractice, on the part of the Republic of Malta's leading financial institution, which has been implicated in one suspected money laundering operation after another, during the past seven years that the Labour Party has been in office.  

None of this has escaped the attention of the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN),  as the United States maintains a zero tolerance policy for wilful violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practises Act, especially where US Dollars are involved, which invoke American jurisdiction over the offenders. Add money laundering to the FCPA, and you have a perfect storm, which greatly increases the probability that FinCEN with sanction the offending bank.

Bankers know that a FinCEN sanction usually operated as a fatal blow to a foreign financial institution, as it is then completely cut off from the American financial structure, due to the risk posed to any global bank that deal with it. Look at the end result when the Latvian Bank ABLV was sanctioned; utter collapse occurred. 

                                             Rubble, rubble, boil & trouble  by COSIMO

Some financial observers fear that Malta's economy could self-destruct if its leading bank was sanctioned by American regulators. Indigenous banks would not be able to take over the traffic, and local branches of foreign banks would decline the dodgy customers forced to flee to their doors. 

What is to be done, then,  bring in outside compliance talent, who could not be bought or bribed, to clean up the mess ? Experts from outside the European Union, with former law enforcement or regulators to advise, would be far more effective than the captive accounting firms from Malta, who like to overcharge, and rarely achieve the desired results. Clean up the bank or close it down, ladies & gentlemen. The money laundering facilitation has to stop.

INTERPOL ISSUES DECISION CANCELLING ORDER TO ARREST AND EXTRADITE MARIA'S EFIMOVA'S HUSBAND, RULING THAT THE CASE IS POLITICAL IN NATURE

Maria Victory  by COSIMO

 INTERPOL has handed down what it has captioned its DECISION CONCERNING PANTELIS VARNAVA, the husband of Malta's whistleblower, Maria Efimova, in its extraordinary examination of the case. In a detailed ten-page ruling, the international police agency, acting through the Chairman of the Commission for the Control of INTERPOL's Files, Vitalie Pirlog, and the Commission Secretariat, the agency found that the lack of evidence supported the argument that the case was of a "Predominant Political nature." The Commision decided in favor of Mr. Varnava, who sought to have the INTERPOL action cancelled.

The ruling, which detailed the long story of Maria Efimova's personal legal nightmare, after she revealed her first-hand knowledge of money laundering activities at Malta's Pilatus Bank, as well as the role played behind the scenes, to create a bogus cause of action against Mr. Varnava, which implicates a number of what the ruling indicates are bad actors in the case, including, but not limited to, Joseph Muscat, the cashiered former prime minister of Malta, and Henley & Partners, in manufacturing fictional charges in Cyprus, through their corrupt influence. Whether there have been violations of EU law committed when the charges were created should be addressed forthwith by the European Commission.

We regret that time prevents our extensive disclosure of the extent of the scope of the Decision, in order to get the word out to our readers during this business day, and our task has been made more difficult by the fact that the Decision has been classified by INTERPOL as "Not Intended for Public Dissemination, " but we shall, in future installments detail each and every piece of evidence considered, as well as findings of fact, that the Commission considered in reaching its conclusions of law and decision. We have reviewed the document, and verified its authenticity.

There is coverage of Daphne Caruana Galizia, as well as identification of Cypriot individuals and corporate entities that reportedly conspired, together with the maltese and foreign conspirators, to create a case against Mr. Varnava devoid of sufficient evidence to support it in a court of law, which is the reason INTERPOL rejected it.

Again, we apologize the the lack of detail, but rest assured, we shall commence the Decision's chapter and verse beginning tomorrow, including sufficient verbatim quotes to allow the reader to understand the agency's methodology, and reasons for its ruling.