Offshore companies: The Brotherhood’s economic empire

By Hour Sameh

Members of the banned Muslim Brotherhood group had secretly opened offshore bank accounts in countries and islands practice money laundering activities such as Cyprus, Costa Rica, Panama, Singapore, Bahamas, Bermuda and Virgin Islands.

Offshore banks are oversea banks locate in countries with low taxes; they do not subject to the international financial censorship and usually linked to the black market, organized crime through tax evasion and money laundering.

Since offshore banks associate with secret economy, tax evasion and concealment of clients’ money resources, Brotherhood group has largely built its economy on the offshore banks of the Bahamas, which was subjected to quick investigations after the September 11 attacks.

The US Treasury Department had previously announced that the Brotherhood’s Al Taqwa and Akeida banks were involved in funding fundamentalist groups, including Hamas, the Islamic Salvation Front, the Armed Islamic Group in Algeria, and the Tunisian Nahda movement, In addition to al-Qaeda.

Also, the CIA revealed that Al Taqwa and other financial institutions of the Muslim Brotherhood were used to fund Al-Qaeda, and help ship arms and encrypted phones to terrorist organizations. By October 2000, the U.S.Treasury accused Al Taqwa Bank of providing a secret credit line to an associate close to Osama bin Laden, the former al Qaeda leader. By late September 2001, Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda had received financial assistance from Youssef Nada, the largest financier of Brotherhood activities,  according to the accusations.

Nada has a network of relationships with many western leaders in the world. He started his business by establishing Al Taqwa Bank in 1988 to be  the first Islamic bank with a capital of more than US $ 258 million. in Europe.

Structures of Terrorism Funding

On October 7, 2002, Washington Post published a report on the Muslim Brotherhood’s economy. It reported that the group managed to build up a solid structure of offshore companies to hide and transfer money around the world. Their overseas companies were too ambiguous to be away from the eyes of intelligence agencies and legal organizations, which chace terrorism financiers all over the world.

The Brotherhood’s economic strategy was based on pillars of secrecy, deception, concealment, violence and opportunism. The most prominent Brotherhood financiers were: Founder of Dar al-Maal al-Islami Trust (DMI) Ibrahim Kamel, who owns an offshore company Nassau of Bahamas; the founders of Al Nassau-based Taqwa bank Yousuf Nada, Ghalib Himmat, Yusuf Al Qaradawi; Idris Nasreddin, the founder of Akida Bank Private Ltd. in Nassau, the report added.

The banks of the Taqwa and Akida are “shell companies” not financial institutions and come under Taqwa Organization, which is associated to another entity owned by Nada in Switzerland, the report continued.

According to the report, Neda was a shareholder in Taqwa bank while Nasreddin assumed the bank director post. Similarly, Akida bank owned and run by Nasreddin, while Nada is a member in the Board of Directors. Other “real” banking activities are being traded with European banks.