Share this page!

Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project Profile picture
Twitter logo
Jun 8 • 3 tweets • 2 min read
NEW: OCCRP and @cerosetenta 🇨🇴 used #DubaiPapers documents and property records to piece together how a Belgian prince, suspected by authorities of wide-ranging financial malpractice, bought multiple luxury properties on Colombia’s Caribbean coast. 1/ occrp.org/en/investigati…
Belgium previously convicted the ‘Black Prince’ Henri De Croÿ for helping clients evade roughly €75m in tax.

His conviction was later overturned, but the #DubaiPapers has since exposed how deep his financial affairs ran, prompting criminal probes in three countries. 2/ Image
De Croÿ’s property fiefdom in Cartagena, Colombia, includes three luxury hotels where rooms can go for roughly $300 a night, and some 12 square kilometers of beachfront on nearby Baru island. 3/ Image

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
　

Keep Current with Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project

Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @OCCRP

Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project Profile picture
May 8
NEW: On the eve of Catalonia's 2017 vote for independence, mysterious Russians reportedly offered 10,000 troops to help the territory break from Spain.

Now OCCRP and partners reveal new details about this #RussianOffer, how it was made — and by whom. 1/

occrp.org/en/investigati…
On the night before the historic vote, Catalonian President Carles Puigdemont met a man whom separatist leaders privately referred to as "Putin’s envoy.”

This was Nikolai Sadovnikov, a longtime diplomat who reportedly claimed to have a direct line to Vladimir Putin. 2/
Sadovnikov had a long career with the Russian foreign ministry — but according to a Western intelligence agency, he was also “an actor of Russian parallel diplomacy” who was “accountable only to the head of state, with whom he claims a certain proximity.” 3/
Read 10 tweets
Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project Profile picture
May 5
NEW: Several European cities say they’ve gone “smoke free” after signing partnership deals with Philip Morris Int'l.

But why would a tobacco giant encourage people to stop smoking cigarettes? It might have something to do with its new product, IQOS. 1/ occrp.org/en/loosetobacc…
As anti-smoking regulations pile up, PMI has focused on promoting IQOS, a heated tobacco device that it markets as safer than cigarettes. (Health experts say there’s no clear evidence for such a claim).

From this pivot, the “Unsmoke Your World” campaign was born. 2/
“Smoke-Free Beach”
“Unsmoke Your World”

You can find this kind of marketing language in dozens of municipalities, hotels, and companies in Europe that signed partnerships with PMI — a violation of @WHO’s tobacco framework. 3/
Read 4 tweets
Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project Profile picture
May 3
NEW: Dubai has long been known as a playground for the rich. Now a new data leak shows that the emirate’s real estate has drawn another clientele: sanctioned politicians, criminals, and dodgy officials from Russia and the EU. This is #DubaiUncovered 1/5
occrp.org/en/investigati…
@C4ADS obtained data on Dubai real estate and shared it with OCCRP and 20+ partners. We investigated and found among the owners:
– 100+ members of Russia’s political elite
– dozens of Europeans implicated in financial crime
– officials accused of mishandling public funds
2/5
@C4ADS They include:
– Ruslan Baisarov, a Russian businessman close to Ramzan Kadyrov, the Chechen leader under Western sanctions for grievous rights abuses
– Alexander Borodai, a sanctioned Russian lawmaker known for his role during Russia’s 2014 invasion of Ukraine
3/5
Read 5 tweets
Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project Profile picture
May 2
NEW: OCCRP found evidence linking Petrochem, a Dubai-based petrochemicals company owned by a prominent Indian tycoon, to a trade in sanctioned Iranian goods. 1/
occrp.org/en/investigati…
The investigation outlines links between the Dubai-based petrochemical distributor and several other firms used to disguise the trade, including overlapping senior staff and registration data. 2/
In 2020, Mumbai customs officials seized a shipment of Iranian petrochemicals aboard a vessel leased by Petrochem. Satellite tracking data shows multiple ships followed similar movements. 3/
Read 4 tweets
Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project Profile picture
Apr 29
NEW: After the invasion of Ukraine, RCB Bank tried to distance itself from its Russian owner, VTB Bank.

But OCCRP found there may be lingering Russian interests at the Cypriot firm, which then said it was shutting down as a bank. 1/
occrp.org/en/investigati…
Russia’s VTB Bank, dubbed ‘Putin’s piggy bank’, which has been sanctioned by the US and EU, sold its shares in Cypriot RCB the same day the conflict began amid pressure from European regulators. 2/
Corporate records indicate those shares were mostly purchased by RCB’s CEO — a former VTB manager close to the Russian bank’s current board — through an obscure Cypriot company. 3/
Read 5 tweets
Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project Profile picture
Apr 6
NEW: In 2015, the OCCRP network uncovered how alleged members of a criminal syndicate, "The Universals," skimmed €19M from a EU project that provided food to low-income Romanians.

Now, we’ve tracked down where some of the money went 👇
occrp.org/en/investigati…
2) The food aid scheme worked like this:

➡️ A firm secretly controlled by alleged members of a Bulgarian gang won an EU contract
➡️ After making a few genuine deliveries, the firm asked for and received a €19M advance
➡️ The money was shuttled to offshores
3) Reporters found that roughly €5M of the stolen funds flowed through a Hong Kong company: Sun Power Industrial Ltd.

Sun Power issued a credit card that spent thousands of euros on luxury hotels, high-end dinners, and at least one designer handbag.
Read 5 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!

This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Don't want to be a Premium member but still want to support us?

Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal

Or Donate anonymously using crypto!

Ethereum

0xfe58350B80634f60Fa6Dc149a72b4DFbc17D341E copy

Bitcoin

3ATGMxNzCUFzxpMCHL5sWSt4DVtS8UqXpi copy

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us on Twitter!

:(