E-Paper
Ex-Pak ISI chief named in global money launderers ‘Suisse secrets’ list
According to NYT report, former ISI chief General Akhtar Abdur Rehman Khan allegedly embezzled funds from the United States meant to be handed over to Afghan fighters against the Russians in the 1980s
A former chief of Pakistan's spy agency Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) is among thousands accused of stashing illegal wealth in a Swiss Bank.
General Akhtar Abdur Rehman Khan, one of the closest aides of former Pakistani dictator Zia-ul-Haq, allegedly helped funnel billions of dollars from the United States and its allies to help the mujahideens in their fight against Russians in Afghanistan, the New York Times reported.
Acccording to the NYT report, the account was opened in the name of three of Khan's sons, adding that the general was never caught for stealing aid money that grew to a whopping 3.7 million dollarsas per the leaked data.
Khan and several high-profile figures including King Abdullah II of Jordan as well as sons of former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak feature in the massive banking data leak from Credit Suisse, Switzerland's second-largest lender.
Termed the Suisse Secrets, this explosive scoop was given to Suddeutsche Zeitung, a German newspaper by an anonymous source who claims to have unearthed the stashed wealth of those accused of money laundering and corruption.
The OCCRP report was stinging and directly accused the former ISI chief, who was in charge of managing the US and Saudi funding for what is being termed as the mujahideen cause.
The report alleges that Khan was adept at getting the US cash into the hands of Afghans by the late 1980s, and it was then that the accounts were opened.
The Suisse Secrets is an international investigation into one of the world's wealthiest and most important banks, the website of Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) reads.
