B of E 'warned over BCCI audit in 1977'

[emad]

From London's Evening Standard 19 Feb 2004:

(sorry, no on line link)

The Bank of England was warned by Luxembourg regulators as far back as 1977 about major problems with auditing the collapsed BCCI, the court hear today - WRITES MALCOLM WITHERS.

Central Bank regulators in Luxembourg told B of E officials that they were unable to audit six of the bank's branches in England. The regulators told B of E officials: "We cannot cope".

The court was also shown internal memos from senior B of E officials that said: "Banks of doubtful standing have been able to branch out into the UK and seek to trade under pretentious titles".

The hearing continues.

[emad]

1. Addendum:

Expecting more on this next week, including how Al-Qaeda-style hawala accounts were being used by BCCI patrons from 1977 onwards to avoid detection of currency movements between cocaine barons in South America and heroin thugs in Turkey and Afghanistan.

Hawala is a dodgy method of paying (eg) Mr x in London $1000 so that Mrs y (no relation/no direct connection) in Bogota gets doshed up.