Bangladeshis linked to Hasina regime seem to have made UK property transactions in previous 12 months

[ad_1] By the point Bangladesh’s student-led revolution lastly toppled Sheikh Hasina, her safety forces had already spilled the blood of lots of of protesters.

Now, nearly a 12 months after the nation’s autocratic chief fled the previous British colony into exile, an interim authorities is struggling to navigate bitter factional politics and financial turmoil.

Towards that traumatic backdrop, a Knightsbridge townhouse in London, or a mansion on a non-public highway in Surrey, appear worlds away.

But luxurious UK actual property is taking part in a central position within the drama.

Investigators in Dhaka have been sifting via allegations that highly effective and politically related figures beneath the earlier regime exploited senior positions to loot state contracts and the banking system, channelling thousands and thousands into UK property.

In Might, the Nationwide Crime Company (NCA) – typically known as Britain’s FBI – froze £90m of property belonging to members of the Rahman household, whose UK portfolio was revealed in a Guardian investigation final 12 months.

Three weeks later, the NCA froze greater than £170m of belongings belonging to Saifuzzaman Chowdhury, a former land minister within the Hasina authorities who amassed an enormous fortune throughout her tenure that included greater than 300 UK properties, starting from flats to lavish townhouses.

The federal government of Sheikh Hasina was toppled by a student-led revolution final 12 months. {Photograph}: Mohammad Ponir Hossain/Reuters Now, an investigation by the Guardian and the marketing campaign group Transparency Worldwide has discovered that a number of Bangladeshis who're beneath scrutiny in Dhaka seem to have both offered, transferred or refinanced UK property for the reason that revolution started.

The transactions elevate questions concerning the freedom with which these beneath suspicion have continued to conduct enterprise in London, in addition to the due diligence carried out by UK legislation companies and consultants who helped facilitate the transactions.

Main figures in Bangladesh’s interim authorities at the moment are calling on Britain to err on the facet of warning by freezing extra UK property belongings whereas the authorities in Dhaka full their investigations.

London property may now play a starring position in what has been billed by some as an extended overdue anti-corruption purge – however by others as a politically motivated witch-hunt.

From Dhaka to the Dorchester The London five-star resort the Dorchester, the place rooms value upwards of £800 an evening, might not appear probably the most acceptable base from which to take purpose at a decadent elite.

But the Mayfair resort’s plush rooms served because the non permanent residence of a big Bangladeshi authorities delegation that visited in early June, led by the interim premier, Muhammad Yunus, on a mission to forge stronger ties with the UK.

London is of specific significance to Bangladesh, due partially to the massive diaspora within the capital, but in addition to the UK’s provide of assist to trace belongings that investigators in Dhaka suppose might have been obtained utilizing laundered cash.

Muhammad Yunus speaks at Cop 29 in Baku, Azerbaijan in November 2024. {Photograph}: Dominika Zarzycka/SOPA Pictures/REX/Shutterstock Ahsan Mansur, the central financial institution governor who's main his nation’s efforts to repatriate belongings, desires extra measures equivalent to these issued in opposition to Chowdhury and the Rahmans.

“We're conscious of efforts to liquidate belongings and we wish the UK authorities to contemplate extra freezing orders,” Mansur stated.

Measures to dam transactions would, he stated, “give us hope of following due course of to repatriate belongings”.

His name was echoed by the chair of Bangladesh’s Anti-Corruption Fee (ACC). Final month, Mohammad Abdul Momen stated he had requested the NCA to contemplate freezing the belongings of a number of people, amid a flurry of post-revolutionary property market exercise.

To freeze or to not freeze Disclosures to the UK Land Registry present no less than 20 “functions for dealing” have been submitted previously 12 months in relation to property owned by figures beneath scrutiny by Dhaka. Such paperwork usually point out a sale, switch or change to a mortgage.

Three relate to £24.5m value of property finally owned by members of the Sobhan household, the highly effective dynasty behind the multibillion-pound Bashundhara enterprise group, a conglomerate that spans cement to media.

One, a four-storey townhouse in Knightsbridge, has been the topic of two current transactions, the aim of that are unclear. Till April final 12 months, it was owned straight by Sayem Sobhan Anvir, Bashundhara’s managing director, through an organization based mostly within the United Arab Emirates.

Sobhan is amongst a number of members of the family beneath investigation by the ACC for allegations together with cash laundering, the Guardian understands.

In April, the property was transferred – apparently freed from cost – to a UK enterprise known as Brookview Heights Ltd. Brookview is owned by a director of Orbis London, an actual property advisory agency with workplaces in Liechtenstein and Singapore that has acted for the Sobhans on property transactions previously.

The London residence seems to have subsequently been offered for £7.35m to a newly shaped firm, whose sole director is an accountant with no on-line profile. The accountant is registered because the proprietor and director of a number of different firms that look like particular objective automobiles for multimillion-pound London properties.

Land Registry information present that UK legislation companies have made two extra functions for dealing on properties owned by one other member of the Sobhan household, Shafiat, together with an £8m mansion in Virginia Water, Surrey.

A member of the family didn't return a request for remark however has beforehand stated that the household deny “all allegations of wrongdoing and can robustly defend ourselves in opposition to these allegations”.

Members of the Sobhan household are amongst a clutch of UK property house owners whose belongings the ACC has requested the NCA to contemplate freezing.

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Two extra people have come beneath scrutiny from the ACC as a part of investigations into Chowdhury.

Each have engaged in a number of property offers over the previous 12 months.

One is Chowdhury’s brother, Anisuzzaman, whereas the opposite is a profitable British-Bangladeshi property developer, whom the Guardian has chosen to not title.

Land Registry knowledge reveals current market exercise on 4 properties owned by Anisuzzaman Chowdhury.

They embrace the sale of a £10m Georgian townhouse on the fringes of Regent’s Park, central London, accomplished final July. An extra three functions, understood to narrate to refinancing, have taken place since.

Attorneys for Anisuzzaman Chowdhury stated he didn't imagine that there was any official cause for any of his belongings to be frozen and that the sale of the Regent’s Park property was agreed in 2023, earlier than the revolution.

In line with experiences in Bangladesh, the ACC has beforehand been requested by the chair of a big native financial institution, UCB, to research whether or not Chowdhury helped the London-based property developer acquire loans irregularly from the lender.

This 12 months, a Bangladeshi court docket imposed a journey ban on the developer, who denies any wrongdoing.

An extra three functions for dealing relate to properties owned by the son and the nephew of Salman F Rahman, who runs the Beximco enterprise group, certainly one of Bangladesh’s largest conglomerates. Ahmed Shayan Rahman and Ahmed Shahryar Rahman are beneath investigation by the ACC.

Grosvenor Sq. in central London, the place a £35m condominium was lately frozen by the Nationwide Crime Company. {Photograph}: AP S (uk)/Alamy The properties, together with a £35m condominium in Mayfair’s Grosvenor Sq., have been frozen by the NCA final month.

Attorneys for the Rahmans stated they denied any wrongdoing. They stated “political upheaval” in Bangladesh had led to allegations being made in opposition to many individuals, including that they might “have interaction with any investigation which takes place within the UK”.

Joe Powell MP, the chair of an all-party parliamentary group inspecting corruption and tax, desires any such investigations to maneuver rapidly.

“Historical past tells us that belongings can rapidly evaporate except swift steps are taken to freeze these belongings whereas investigations are beneath method,” he stated.

Powell welcomed the motion already taken by the NCA however urged it to “increase the web as quickly as doable”.

The Labour MP leads a gaggle of parliamentarians that's focusing on London’s popularity as a house for suspicious funds and people who allow the switch of that wealth, notably given the renewed concentrate on oligarchs that adopted Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Transparency Worldwide is elevating questions over the position performed by a number of UK companies which have acted for people the NCA has already focused, or who the ACC has named.

The legislation agency Jaswal Johnston submitted functions on properties owned by the Rahmans. A spokesperson stated the agency had not been concerned in any gross sales and that it took its due diligence obligations “extraordinarily severely”.

Merali Beedle, a legislation agency that made functions for dealing on one £35m Rahman property and one other £8m residence owned by a member of the Sobhan household, declined to remark.

A spokesperson for Transparency Worldwide stated: “Skilled companies companies ought to train excessive warning when conducting regulated actions for purchasers recognized to be beneath investigation. They need to carry out complete source-of-wealth checks and instantly report suspicious exercise to police.