A Scots investment firm has been named in an online leak that allegedly shows how Russian mafia money was laundered via companies in the west.
The disclosure – known as the Troika Laundromat – claims to chart how offshore shell companies were used to move billions of dollars out of Moscow.
Investigative journalists at the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) and the Lithuanian news site 15min. lt uncovered the scheme, which is under investigation by Russian prosecutors.
Their latest leak claims that in 2009 nearly £400,000 of transactions passed through Edinburgh -based firm Mirabax Investments offshore to Panama.
Panama City-based Intrans Capital Inc received the payments before closing a year later.
Paperwork shows two payments for computer equipment by Mirabax Investments to Intrans Capital.
The leak shows how tens of millions of pounds flowed to and from Intrans Capital before it closed in 2010.
Mirabax Investments was set up in 2004 and its registered office was at a residential flat in Edinburgh.
Cypriot accountant Marios Papantoniou’s firm Axiano filed the original paperwork in 2004 and was the firm’s sole director before it was dissolved in 2016. Public documents don’t mention the payments made to Panama in 2009.
Previous firms set up by Papantoniou have been linked to the scheme which the OCCRP say helped move £3.6billion out of Russia with the help of staff from investment bank Troika Dialog.
Last year, it was reported firms linked to Papantoniou were allegedly used to “flush” dirty money out of the former Soviet Union. It is understood Papantoniou, 64, has retired and is living in Cyprus. Axiano has shut and another firm occupies the office building in Edinburgh.
We contacted Papantoniou’s son, Alexandros, to speak to his father but he did not respond.
Papantoniou has previously denied any wrongdoing.
Last month, it was revealed money linked to the Troika Laundromat had been used to pay for repairs to Prince Charles ’s Dumfries House in Ayrshire, and private school fees.
Politicians have urged action. Scottish Greens MSP Andy Wightman said: “I’ve repeatedly called for the UK Government to act in the face of the mounting evidence of fraudulent activity but they have been slow even to acknowledge a problem exists.”
The OCCRP said: “The Troika Laundromat database may contain legitimate business transactions and the presence of any name in this dataset does not necessarily imply any intentional wrongdoing.”
