Suspension of Activities of Bank Linked to Ali Sadr Hashemi Nejad in Malta Hours After His Arrest in the U.S.

The regulatory authority for financial services and banking in Malta issued an immediate ruling on Wednesday, April 1, removing Ali Sadr Hashemi Nejad from the presidency of Pilatus Bank and announcing the suspension of all services of this bank. Earlier that day, reports emerged in the U.S. that an Iranian named Ali Sadr Hashemi Nejad, 38, had been arrested on charges of circumventing U.S. sanctions and transferring $115 million to Iran. According to the New York District Attorney's Office, the Sadr family controls a company named 'Startus', which is a financial group involved in international economic activities. This group is responsible for a project to build thousands of homes in Venezuela, stemming from agreements made between Tehran and Caracas in 2004 and 2005. Now, according to a report by Agence France-Presse from Malta, the 'Malta Financial Services Authority', which oversees banking activities, has removed Mr. Sadr Hashemi Nejad from the presidency of Pilatus Bank. According to the authority's ruling, Pilatus Bank is also prohibited from any banking activities related to its directors and shareholders and is barred from transferring money and capital. In this context, the Prime Minister of Malta informed the country's parliament on Wednesday evening that the regulatory authority has moved towards revoking Pilatus Bank's license. Reports indicate that members of parliament in Malta and a Maltese member of the European Parliament have called for the revocation of Pilatus Bank's license, with one representative criticizing the granting of a license to this bank in the first place. However, Pilatus Bank and its president, Ali Sadr Hashemi Nejad, are not only in the media spotlight due to circumventing Iranian sanctions, especially in Maltese media. In October 2017, a Maltese blogger who exposed Malta's connections with offshore tax havens through the 'Panama Papers' was killed in a car explosion. Daphne Caruana Galizia, 53, who published the results of her investigative journalism on a critical blog, had accused several Maltese officials, including Prime Minister Joseph Muscat, of abuse or financial corruption months before her death. All these Maltese officials had accounts at Mr. Sadr Hashemi Nejad's bank, Pilatus, and Ms. Galizia was killed when a case against her was opened in court by Ali Sadr Hashemi Nejad's bank. Now, the children of Ms. Galizia, whom Politico referred to as the 'one-woman WikiLeaks', have issued a statement expressing their satisfaction with the arrest of this Iranian national in the U.S. In the statement, the children of the murdered journalist also mentioned that 'Hashemi Nejad constantly threatened our mother.' The children of this journalist had previously called for the resignation of the Prime Minister of Malta; however, Joseph Muscat and his wife have denied all financial allegations against them. In this context, on Tuesday of this week, a former employee of Pilatus Bank named Maria Efimova, who left Malta for Greece last year and was wanted in Europe for embezzlement, surrendered to the Greek police. According to most reports, Daphne Galizia had identified Ms. Efimova as a source who had provided her with banking documents indicating the corruption of the Prime Minister of Malta and his wife. Maria Efimova was employed at Pilatus for three months in 2016.