Hain urges probe of SOEs' London accounts

British parliamentarian Lord Peter Hain has called for an investigation into any bank accounts held in London by SA state-owned entities, reports Fin24. In a speech in the House of Lords, he said the UK needed to be serious in ensuring its financial institutions stopped being used to pilfer public money from countries around the world. Hain said the amendment to the Money Laundering Bill they were proposing would make it easier to hold large global banks, like HSBC, to account, both for poor procedures and for turning a blind eye to handling corrupt wealth. The majority of Hain’s speech focused on SA, and like his speech on 1 November he described massive money laundering which he said was organised from the very top of government – the Presidency itself – and ‘the systemic transnational financial crime network facilitated by an Indian-South African family, the Guptas, and the Presidential family, the Zumas’. Hain said SA had suffered enough repression during apartheid and the UK should not stand idly by while economic repression replaced racial repression ‘to serve the greed of corrupt leaders, when we have the ability to help stop it’.