Classified documents from
The documents, rarely seen Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs), were filed by the banking giant's
The reports were filed in 2011 and 2013 to the
According to the documents,
But despite also being told that two other banks - one Swiss and one Lebanese - had refused to handle the funds - the FIU appears to have given
In doing so, it may also have immunised
The money, the proceeds of the notorious OPL245 oil deal, was then allegedly used for kickbacks, to buy a private jet, an armoured
The documents underline serious failings in the use of SARs, which are meant to be a central plank in the international fight against money laundering.
Last week, a massive leak of suspicious activity reports from the US's financial intelligence unit, FinCen, and published by the
Critics claim they are little more than exercises in ticking boxes that allow banks to duck their responsibilities.
"There is little prospect of winning the battle against money laundering without some kind of radical shift in how we deal with this," she said.
"It can't be right that banks can effectively shrug off their responsibility for handling dirty money by filing a SAR and passing the buck to overstretched and underfunded law enforcement bodies."
A spokesman for the
OPL245 - The background
In the OPL 245 deal,
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Etete had awarded Malabu the rights to the block in 1998 when he was
Within weeks of the deal in
The major players in the deal, including
But the deal has also spawned further lawsuits, including efforts by a new presidential regime in
The latest is a
The SAR files
It has cited its SAR submissions in its defence, claiming that the FIU gave it consent to make the payments.
The SARs were obtained by Eni via the
They also show just how strong the corruption suspicions were among
In each of the nine SARs made by the bank over this two year period,
In its first report to the FIU in
The report also noted Etete's recent money laundering conviction in
The bank then told the FIU that one attempted payment to Swiss bank BSI Lugano had already been rejected "for compliance reasons," because BSI was "not comfortable" receiving the funds.
After a second bank, this one in
These instructions, according to the compliance official, had "resulted from the rejection by Banque Misr Liban of the earlier payment".
This turned out to be the last chance that
According to
But at this point, a senior FIU officer emailed
In a highly revealing exchange in
They then made the payment.
In its legal defence to
By the time
According to the SARs, which have been published on Eni's website,
In its final reports to the FIU in 2013, the bank detailed "pieces of information... that give rise to suspicion that the funds may constitute criminal property".
These included "Production orders obtained by the Metropolitan Police Proceeds of Corruption Unit, Specialist Economic and Organised Crime Command and the facts and matters detailed in support of applications for these orders".
It also referred to a potential Serious Fraud Office investigation related to the funds.
Nonetheless, the bank still sought permission from the FIU to pay a balance of more than
A spokesman for the NCA said he could not confirm nor deny facts relating to possible operational activity.
But he explained that at that time the law required there to be a realistic chance of "positive law enforcement" within 31 days of the FIU refusing consent for such payments.
Under the Criminal Finances Act, introduced in 2017, this time period was extended to six months.
It is not clear why the FIU might have deemed there no realistic chance of enforcement action against the payments in 2011 and 2013, but those who have followed this deal closely believe a major factor was that the payment instructions came from the Nigerian government itself.
Analysis: SARs system is broken
Whilst the 2017 Criminal Finances Act has made it easier for law enforcement to freeze suspicious funds, and given it a greater time period in which to do so, the SARs regime is still troubled.
The volume of SARs has proliferated in recent years. In 2019 the
However, its 118 employees only have the capacity to investigate and block a tiny fraction of these. Of the 34,500 SARs it received last year that had a request for a "defence against money laundering", 96% were granted.
The NCA has complained that these volumes are "untenable". Its annual report states that from this barrage of reporting, law enforcement was able to freeze just £132 million.
This suggests that banks are being given de facto permission to make thousands of transactions they know to be suspicious.
"The current figures on the paltry amounts confiscated as a result of SARs are pretty damning," says
"Ultimately, we have to start thinking ambitiously about a SARs regime that results in banks declining dodgy transactions unless explicitly authorised by law enforcement to go ahead for intelligence purposes."
A spokesperson for the NCA said: "We recognise there is more work that needs to be done in this area, hence our commitment to the Home Office led SARs Reform Programme which aims, among other things, to improve the quality of SARs reporting."
Last year the
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