Pilatus Bank Inquiry Recommendations Published In Judicial Protest Referencing Egrant And A $1.1 Million Transaction
Verbatim conclusions of the Pilatus Bank magisterial inquiry have been published and submitted to the courts.
Repubblika President Robert Aquilina published the details as part of a judicial protest demanding that Magistrate Nadine Lia recuse herself from the NGO’s case conernring the failure of police to prosecute a number of people as part of the inquiry.
The NGO has pointed to her relationship with her father-in-law Pawlu Lia, who is the personal lawyer of Joseph Muscat and other Labour Party exponents, some of whom were linked to the Pilatus case, which included kickbacks from passports and the Egrnat inquiry.
Lia has also claimed that Repubblika could not have seen the inquiry’s conclusions.
Four of the recommendations shared were:
1. Seeking information from US authorities or through a discovery application to US correspondent banks of whether the alleged 1.107million USD Egrant transaction took place and if so which banks were involved.
2. Interviewing former employee Ms Efimova regarding the alleged Egrant account and transactions and the alleged parallel accounting system
3. Interviewing former employee Ms Stankovic regarding the alleged parallel system and illegal actions noted by Ms Stankovic during her time at the bank
The now-infamous Pilatus Bank was made subject to its own inquiry after the European Central Bank shut it down over money laundering allegations.
The inquiry was concluded in 2020 and late last year, Claude Anne Sant Fournier had been charged in connection with money laundering offences in his role as Money Laundering Report Officer (MLRO) and director of the bank, but several other names seemed to have eluded the police.
The bank has faced criticism for the veil of secrecy surrounding politically exposed persons (PEPs).
It has been at the centre of various inquires so far, including the recent inquiry involving kickbacks on the citizenship-by-investment scheme between Schembri and Nexia BT’s Brian Tonna.
It also played a crucial part in the infamous Egrant inquiry which found no evidence that the Prime Minister or his wife held any Pilatus accounts as had been alleged by the now-assassinated journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia.
Several top officials held bank accounts at Pilatus, with a company at the heart of a US investigation on dirty money for Venezuelan politicians, Portmann Capital, transferring €120 million through the bank.
A network of over 50 companies and trusts secretly owned by Azerbaijan’s ruling elite also used accounts at the bank, funnelling millions into Europe. The Egrant Inquiry flagged the issue and said it merited further investigation.
What do you think of the recommendations?
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