The Center for Corruption and Organized Crime Research (OOCRP), as well as journalists from 39 countries (48 media) on February 20 published an international investigation #SuisseSecrets (“Credit Suisse Secrets”) about the clients of the Swiss bank Credit Suisse.
This is reported on the website of the center. From Russia, the publication “Important Stories”, recognized in the country as a “foreign agent”, took part in the project.
More than 18,000 Credit Suisse accounts have been leaked to the OCCRP through the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, the largest ever leaked by a major Swiss bank. The information was provided by an anonymous source. The maximum total in all these accounts exceeded $100 billion.
“Swiss banks are famous for their secrecy, conjuring up thoughts of treasures that are safely hidden in mountain vaults. And the Swiss government is doing everything possible to maintain this reputation,” the organization notes.
It is assumed that banks in Switzerland do not work with clients who earn illegally. But among the account holders at Credit Suisse, journalists found corrupt officials, members of the underworld and alleged human rights violators.
Among them is a human trafficker in the Philippines, a Hong Kong stock exchange boss arrested for bribery, a billionaire who ordered the murder of his girlfriend, Lebanese pop stars, executives who plundered Venezuela’s state oil company, and corrupt politicians from Egypt to Ukraine, The Guardian notes.
These leaks do not cover the present, although many accounts were active until 2010 and beyond. Most accounts were opened in 2007 and 2008. Most closed in 2014. Then Switzerland adopted new rules that provided for the automatic exchange of tax information about foreign clients.
Among the well-known clients of the bank, journalists found several people from the former USSR:
- ex-president of Armenia Armen Sargsyan;
- Mayor of Baku Eldar Azizov;
- one of the largest Ukrainian smugglers;
- some employees of the special services of Uzbekistan.
The leaked data contained information only about “ordinary” Russian businessmen with dual citizenship or living abroad in countries with which Switzerland does not have an agreement on the exchange of financial information. There is no data on people living directly in Russia in this database, therefore Russian politically significant persons are not mentioned in it, Important Stories notes.
At the same time, journalists found the heroes of their recent investigations: the families of the current president of Kazakhstan, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, and his predecessor, Nursultan Nazarbayev.
According to the leaked data, Nazarbayev’s second daughter Dinara Kulibayeva and her husband Timur Kulibayev owned accounts with Credit Suisse from 2008 to 2012. During this time, an amount equivalent to 164 billion rubles (at the exchange rate for December 2012) visited their accounts.
The eldest daughter of the ex-president of Kazakhstan, Dariga Nazarbayeva, known for her assets in Europe, from 2008 to 2012 owned six accounts totaling 5 billion rubles (in different currencies, at the exchange rate for December 2012).
The closest relatives of the current president of Kazakhstan were also found in the leak. From 1998 to 2011, Timur Tokaev and his mother Nadezhda owned an account with Credit Suisse containing 165 million rubles in different currencies (at the December 2011 exchange rate). On two accounts of the president’s sister, Karlyga Izbastin, there were 223 million rubles in different currencies (at the exchange rate for December 2012). The accounts were active from 2010 to 2012.
After “preliminary screening” of “a large number of accounts” about which journalists asked questions, the bank said that “more than 90 percent” of them were already “closed or in the process of closing.” Credit Suisse officials dismissed “suspicions and inferences about the bank’s alleged business practices.”
The statements presented by the journalists are a deliberate discrediting of the bank and the Swiss financial system, which has undergone significant changes over the past few years. In line with financial reforms in government and banking over the past ten years, Credit Suisse has taken a number of significant additional steps, including investing heavily in the fight against financial crime.
Credit Suisse representatives