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Britain and US Target Russian Money Laundering Networks

U.K. and U.S. authorities on Wednesday disclosed a joint operation against two Russian money laundering networks catering to oligarchs as well as crime syndicates at home and in Europe, the Middle East and Latin America.

The U.K. National Crime Agency said in a statement that Smart, a network headed by Ekaterina Zhdanova, a U.S.-blacklisted Russian national, and TGR, which is led by Ukrainian national George Rossi, used their global reach to move funds for transnational crime groups, including the Irish Kinahan drug cartel now based in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

Both networks coordinated their activities and collected funds from criminals in one country and transferred the money by paying out an equivalent sum through an associate in another country, often by swapping cryptocurrency for cash, the NCA said, adding that its operation had led to 84 arrests and the seizure of £20 million in cash and cryptocurrency.

Britain was a “key hub” for both networks, which also helped wealthy Russians evade Western sanctions and invest their money in Britain, while the Russian government used the Smart network from late 2022 to mid-2023 to fund espionage operations, according to the agency.

The U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Asset Control on Wednesday blacklisted Rossi and five other members of both networks as well as five entities linked to both groups. OFAC had already designated Zhdanova in November 2023.

Moneylaundering.com may update this coverage as more information becomes available.
Topics : Anti-money laundering , Cryptocurrencies
Source: United Kingdom: National Crime Agency
Document Date: December 4, 2024