German prosecutors search finance & justice ministries
as part of money-laundering probe
9 Sep, 2021 13:15
Germany's finance ministry in Berlin. © Reuters / Annegret Hilse
German prosecutors have searched the offices of the finance and justice ministries in Berlin, seizing documents related to a probe into possible obstruction of justice by a government agency tasked with tackling money laundering.
The Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU), which is part of the Finance Customs Administration controlled by the Finance Ministry, has been under investigation since last year. The agency is suspected of not forwarding to law enforcement agents reports by banks of possible money laundering in the millions of euros.
The probe had been initiated after sketchy payments of more than €1 million (around $1.18 million) to Africa in 2018. At that time, the bank warned the FIU that the money could’ve been linked to trafficking of arms and drugs as well as financing of terrorism. The agency took note of the information, but refrained from passing it on to the police and the justice ministry.
The prosecutors were also looking into the reasons for a drastic decrease in the overall number of reports of suspicious activity since the FIU was assigned the job of controlling money laundering in Germany.
The investigators had previously raided the Finance Customs Administration, saying the papers they secured back then revealed “extensive communications” between the FIU and the two ministries.
The search at the Finance and Justice Ministries on Thursday was aimed at “further clarifying the suspected criminal offense” and establishing if the officials in those ministries had been involved in the decision made by the FIU. The analysis of the newly obtained documents is going to take at least several weeks, the prosecutors said.
The two ministries released almost identical statements in response to the raid, saying that they expressed full support of the investigation, but stressing that no suspicion was directed against their staff.
Ukrainian authorities launch probe over death of judge who oversaw
investigation into car-bomb murder of Russian journalist
13 Sep, 2021 18:15 / Updated 2 hours ago
Journalist Pavel Sheremet. © Reuters / Valentyn Ogirenko
Ukrainian police have launched a probe following the death of Vitaly Pisants, an investigating judge in the as-yet-unsolved case of Pavel Sheremet, a Russian journalist murdered in the center of Kiev by a car bomb in 2016.
According to Ukrainian outlet Novaya Vremya, Pisants' death came as he was considering motions to extend the detention of three people thought to be behind Sheremet's murder.
Sheremet, who was best known for his writings about Belarus, died in the Kiev explosion, which the Ukrainian Prosecutor's Office says was caused by a bomb. In December 2019, three were arrested on suspicion of murdering Sheremet. According to the authorities, the killing was ordered and organized by Andrey Antonenko, a well-known military veteran and musician. Two other defendants, Yana Dugar and Yulia Kuzmenko, were detained as accomplices. They were all put under house arrest awaiting trial.
Now, with Pisants dead, the police are considering whether he may have been murdered to stop him from keeping the three in prison.
According to reports, the judge died on September 11 in the village of Pogreby, where he was visiting the house of Pyotr Onopenko, the brother of the former head of the Supreme Court. Some Ukrainian media sources have claimed that he died in a drunken fight between his friends: a police officer and a lawyer.
The case of Sheremet's murder is still unsolved, five years after it happened. According to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, counterintelligence officers from the country's Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) could have been involved.
"There is a possibility that certain individuals who were connected to counterintelligence during [Petro Poroshenko's] presidency may be involved [in the killing]," Zelensky said.
"I do not interfere in the activities of law enforcement agencies and the court. But I know in detail what happened," he said.
Born in Soviet Belarus, Sheremet was a naturalized Russian and spent much of his career working on TV. He also wrote for the Ukrainian online publication Ukrayinska Pravda. At the time of his murder, Sheremet was a public critic of Poroshenko, as well as Russian President Vladimir Putin and their Belarusian counterpart Alexander Lukashenko.
That's a lot of powerful enemies!
Pohreby, UKR
Inquiry launched into European Commission chief’s refusal
to hand over text messages she exchanged with Pfizer CEO
17 Sep, 2021 13:41
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen visits a Pfizer vaccine production plant in Puurs, Belgium, April 2021. © John Thys / Reuters
The European Ombudsman has demanded that Commission President Ursula von der Leyen explain how she lost text messages that she exchanged with the CEO of Pfizer during talks about vaccine procurement.
European Ombudsman Emily O’Reilly, the EU’s top accountability and governance officer, launched an inquiry into the European Commission’s refusal to hand over the contents of communications between von der Leyen and a CEO of an unnamed pharmaceutical company about a Covid-19 vaccine contract.
As a first step, O’Reilly asked the Commission to explain its policy on keeping records of von der Leyen’s text messages. “The Commission has an obligation to record instant messages relating to important policy or political matters, such as the procurement of Covid-19 vaccines,” O’Reilly’s office wrote in a statement about the case.
In April, the New York Times reported that von der Leyen had been exchanging texts and calls with Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla for a month as part of negotiations about vaccine procurement for the bloc. The paper wrote at the time that personal diplomacy played a big role in securing the vaccine deal.
O’Reilly requested that the Commission hand over the text messages, but the Commission claimed that “no record had been kept of any such messages,” according to the ombudsman’s office.
The office has previously warned about the importance of record-keeping within EU institutions amid an increased amount of remote work in the Covid era. “EU administration is required by EU law to draw up and retain documentation pertaining to its activities, as far as possible and in a non-arbitrary and predictable manner,” the watchdog said in June.
Pfizer remains one of the EU’s major vaccine suppliers after sealing several deals with Brussels. The delays in shipments earlier this year frustrated EU leaders, including von der Leyen herself. “Europe invested billions to help develop the world’s first Covid-19 vaccines,” she said in January. “And now, the companies must deliver. They must honor their obligations.”
Did Ursula use her private e-mail account to bargain with Bourla? Is that legal? It is certainly not secure. Did she learn this from Hillary Clinton?
The head of the tech department needs to be fired, at the very least.
South Africa top court rejects ex-president Zuma’s bid
to overturn 15-month jail sentence
17 Sep, 2021 11:25
Former South African President Jacob Zuma speaks to supporters after appearing at the High Court in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa, May 17, 2021. © Reuters / Rogan Ward
South Africa’s former President Jacob Zuma’s plea to overturn his 15-month prison sentence handed to him after failing to attend a corruption hearing has been rejected by the country’s top court.
South Africa's Constitutional Court ruled in a majority on Friday and rejected Zuma’s request to annul his jail time, which the disgraced former leader had argued was excessive and that Covid-19 could pose serious risks to his health, and even life, in July.
The 79-year-old anti-apartheid veteran was released on medical parole earlier this month after the country’s Department of Correctional Services (DCS) evaluated a report on Zuma’s health. The placement meant that he will instead serve his remaining jail time on a community corrections course, “whereby he must comply with a specific set of conditions and will be subjected to supervision until his sentence expires,” the DCS stated.
In August, Zuma underwent an unspecified surgery away from the Escourt prison he was being kept in. The politician is slated to undergo more surgeries in the future.
Zuma handed himself in to police on July 7 and began serving his 15-month jail term for contempt of court after failing to give evidence at an inquiry concerning high-level corruption during his nine years in office.
His jailing, combined with soaring unemployment and poor economic conditions, spurred some of the worst riots seen in South Africa, especially in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng, where the Army was called in to deal with the unrest. More than 300 people died during the turbulent period and some 3,400 people were arrested.
The current president of South Africa, Cyril Ramaphosa, condemned the riots, describing them as “opportunistic acts of criminality, with groups of people instigating chaos merely as a cover for looting and theft.”
International weightlifting doctor lands lifetime ban for sending
lookalikes to take drugs tests for athletes charged with doping
18 Sep, 2021 13:14
Doctor Dorin Balmus has been found guilty of sending lookalikes to doping tests
© Action Images / John Marsh via Reuters | © Facebook / Dorin Balmus
A doctor who worked with three weightlifters has been banned for life after being found guilty of sending lookalikes to take drugs tests for the athletes at world championships before they were charged with doping offenses.
Moldovan medic Dorin Balmus was representing Iurie Bulat, Ghenadie Dudoglo and Artiom Pipa when the trio of weightlifters were asked to provide samples shortly before the world championships in Houston in 2015.
Instead, Balmus arranged for three doppelgangers to give samples under the names of the stars because they were "each undergoing a doping cycle at the time", the International Testing Agency (ITA) has revealed.
An investigation by the World Anti-Doping Agency's Intelligence and Investigation Department found that the three stand-ins had been asked to provide clean samples on behalf of the athletes to negate the risk of failed tests.
The athletes subsequently tested positive for a prohibited substance, receiving punishments for that offense and using urine substitution in an attempt to dupe testers.
Balmus admitted the offense when he was covertly filmed in an interview with the makers of a documentary, 'Secret Doping – the Lord of the Lifters', which was aired by a German broadcaster in January 2020.
The experienced orthopedic traumatology specialist unwittingly told the reporters that he would also pay Doping Control Officers (DCOs) to "turn a blind eye" rather than closely scrutinize passports presented by the athletes, according to the ITA's findings.
His statements to the documentary suggested "a co-ordinated program of urine substitution implicating athletes, DCOs and high-ranking officials", their report said.
The agency has taken the rare step of exiling Balmus for life from any activity authorized or organized by any signatory of the World Anti-Doping Code, acting because of the "nature and severity of the rule violations."
Responding to the report, which included the Balmus case as part of a review of numerous Anti-Doping Rule Violations between 2009 and 2019 across a range of countries, Antonio Conflitti, the President of the Moldavian Weightlifting Federation, called it "another blow" to the sport that he "very much hoped" would be the last of its kind.
"I will continue my fight against doping and my work to consolidate and create a new and clean European Weightlifting Federation governance," he added.
Tamas Ajan, the long-standing president of the federation, stood down following the documentary, which reported on other doping cover-ups and financial irregularities at the organization.
The three Moldavian athletes were each handed four-year bans in 2015.
