Organized Criminal Activities of the Bank of Credit and Commerce International: Essays and Documentation

The Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI), which perpetrated the "biggest bank fraud in history", was founded by Agha Hassan Abedi and initially registered in Luxembourg in 1972. Its other centre of operations was the Cayman Islands and eventually it operated in 73 countries. In the summer of 1991, it was shuttered by the Bank of England. Its many crimes included illegally buying American banks using "straw men" and courting powerful American politicos, laundering drug profits, plundering deposits to conceal grotesque losses on treasury trading, and making illicit loans totalling around a billion dollars that were not expected to be serviced. BCCI also ran accounts for both international terrorists and several national intelligence services. What follows in this book are essays dealing with certain aspects of BCCI's misbehaviour and various odd structures, as well as an important document from Luxembourg's Civil Court, detailing charges against BCCI's auditor, Price Waterhouse subsequently PricewaterhouseCoopers.