Hisham Abu Mariam-Paris
France's Channel 2 aired Tuesday evening a cache investigation into drug money laundering, which uncovers the laundering of millions of euros from France's cannabis trade, estimated at around 1 billion euros (1.1 billion dollars) a year.
The investigation reveals that drug money is transferred in cash from France to Morocco and Belgium and ends in Dubai, where it is placed in various UAE banks, to be entered into the international banking system in the form of investments or regular transfers.
The investigation reveals several parties involved in the process of laundering drug money, the first of which is called the "cash collectors", the first link in the chain of money laundering, to take over the task of collecting and transporting millions of euros a month in various French cities, which are delivered To another person who in turn transfers them to Morocco or Algeria through the hawala system.
Hawala is a means of transferring funds from one country to another and from one currency to another through a network of persons outside the recognized banking system, which depends mainly on the element of trust.
The television investigation quoted the head of the French anti-money laundering police Counta Mouj how a Moroccan businessman named Noureddine Chaouti founded a company specializing in the hawala system to transfer millions of euros of drug money from France to Morocco.
In order to launder the money, El Chaouti bought more than 3,000 kilograms of gold in cash in Belgium in one year (2012), which was then sold to Caloti Jewelery in Dubai through a fake company named Ronad International, owned by Abdel Wahed. Chaouti, Noureddine's brother, has laundered 259 million euros ($ 288 million) in drug money in one year.
A copy of the film on drug money laundering by Dubai-based Ronad Company (French Channel 2) |
Two companies in the UAE
After the transfer of gold from Belgium to the Caloti Jewelery Company, based in Dubai by smuggling by intermediaries from Brussels to Dubai, the company buys gold quantities from Noureddine Chaouti, and transfer money through Alfardan Exchange in the UAE, which is then transferred To different countries in the form of investments in companies or regular transfers.
"Alfardan Exchange" specializes in laundering dirty money, with 11,000 bank transfers worldwide - including France, the United States and China - with hundreds of millions of dollars in money, the film revealed.
The French judiciary has issued an international arrest warrant for the brothers Chaouati for involvement in laundering more than 250 million euros (277 million dollars) of drug money in France.
Confidential documents
The investigation team obtained confidential documents revealing that the purchase of Kaloti jewelry from several international companies more than five billion dollars of gold in cash in 2012 to avoid any international prosecution.
The documents also revealed that Caloti imported more than four tons of silver-plated gold from Morocco. The investigation adds that the UAE company owns refineries that produce 300 tons of gold annually.
The French Channel 2 investigation proved that a network of companies operating in Dubai and the UAE colluded in laundering dirty money from drug smuggling and dealt with embarrassingly with the emperors of the world's death trade. Suspicious companies.