Austrian banks have laundered 2 billion euros of Mafia
Font size:
ennahar
VIENNA - Austrian banks have helped from 2005 to 2007 the laundering of some two billion euros on behalf of the Italian Mafia, reported Sunday the weekly Austrian weekly Profil.
- According to documents that the newspaper would have had access, the money was laundered through 14 accounts domiciled at Raiffeisen Zentralbank and Bank Austria - which belongs to the Italian UniCredit Group - and the Austrian branch of Anglo Irish Bank.
Remittances were made by the Internet Service Providers Italian Fastweb and Telecom Italia Sparkle (TIS), the weekly said.
According to this source, the Vienna public prosecutor opened an investigation. The banks declined to comment on the report but said they were cooperating with authorities.
According to the weekly, three banks had before the publication of information, informed the authorities of the movements of funds from their Italian customers.
In autumn 2007, the Vienna public prosecutor, granting a request of his fellow Romans, had ordered the inspection of accounts under investigation but the alleged fraudsters knew even then that their accounts were no longer safe, said weekly. Fastweb and TIS used these accounts to transfer funds to large firms after having taken their share, the newspaper said.
Last month, Rome prosecutors sought the arrest of 56 people, including Silvio Scaglia, founder of Fastweb, following a major case of money laundering and tax evasion.
Fastweb and TIS - a subsidiary of Telecom Italia - are suspected of having billed for fictive telephone services and internet of a $ 1.8 billion, equivalent to a tax evasion estimated at 365 million Euros.
- Ennaharonline/ M. O.
Add to:
Email to a friend
Print version
Plain textRate this article
Comments (0 posted):
Post your comment