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Bank of Commerce and Credit International (BCCI)
Last Updated: February 04, 2009

At its height, BCCI had $20 billion in assets with subsidiaries in 73 countries. In fact it  was less a bank, than a known money laundry for global terrorists, drug cartels, dictators, certain US officials and rogue CIA operations.

It was the clearinghouse for the illegal Iran-Contra operations. Innocent depositors' money, more than $13 billion dollars, simply disappeared.

A  1992 US Senate report found that FBI and other officials turned a blind eye, and actually hindered investigations of BCCI, for more than a decade. When Manhattan D.A. Robert Morgenthau brought charges that year, he called it "the largest financial fraud in world history."

One of its most infamous clients was Abu Nadal, the Palestinian terrorist whose Fatah-Revolutionary Council, killed at least 900 people in multiple attacks all over the world. Another early customer was Osama bin Laden.

Founded in 1972 by a Pakistani banker with money from a United Arab Emirates ruler (Abu Sheik Zayed) and the Bank of America, the bank was  a massive Ponzi scheme, siphoning money as it came in, using fresh deposits to cover its tracks. At least $13 billion was stolen from them.

BCCI managed to avoid scrutiny by bribing regulators in governments around the world. BCCI also got an assist from Arkansas billionaire Jackson Stephens, who arranged financial bailouts for George W. Bush as well as Bill Clinton.

In 1978 Stephens launched BCCI's planned takeover of National Bank of Georgia and DC's First American Bankshares. Noted frontmen included former Defense Secretary Clark Clifford, and President Carter's budget director Bert Lance, before both were indicted.

Jackson Stephens company, Stephens Inc., was the largest client of Arkansas' Rose Law Firm, where Hillary Clinton was  partner. She was an attorney of record for Stephens, as BCCI co-defendant against charges brought by First American stockholders and the SEC.  BCCI’s covert acquisitions weren't just illegal schemes – they gave the malignant BCCI access to the U.S. banking system.
 
One of Jackson Stephens' partners was Khalid bin Mahfouz, a Saudi billionaire who owned 30 percent of BCCI’s stock. In the bi-partisan spirit, BCCI arranged a $25 million bailout of George W Bush's Harken Energy oil company in 1988.

After its collapse three years later, Mahfouz was indicted on multiple charges of fraud. He settled by paying a $225 million dollar fine. That same year Mahfouz created the charity (Muwafaq), later named by the US Treasury as a terror finance front.

After Clinton's election, the charity's CEO, Yassin Al-Qadi, started a small software company named Ptech. Mahfouz and a few others were co-funders. Then, with  fewer than thirty employees, this startup firm was given management control of the United States' most vital information systems.

FBI agents presented evidence of Al-Qadi funneling money directly to Bin Laden, but it was quashed. One of the partners, named Alamoudi, was appointed a Pentagon advisor in 1994, by President Clinton.

It wasn't until after 9/11 that Al-Qadi, by then a fugitive, was named a Designated Global Terrorist. Alamoudi was later convicted on terror finance charges, and given a 23 year prison sentence.

No charges, since BCCI, have ever been brought against Mahfouz. His conglomerate partner, also named Al-Amoudi, contributed $20 million dollars to the Bill Clinton Foundation   

 


Categories

International Finance | Terror Funding | Homeland Security

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