Investigation“Swiss Secrets” | The establishment has hosted about forty accounts for senior intelligence service officers around the world, despite the opaque origin of the funds.
Is a master spy a client like the others? This is the question that was undoubtedly posed to Credit Suisse employees when they opened an account in the name of Omar Souleiman in 1996. At the time, this soldier was already in charge of the powerful Egyptian intelligence service, armed wing of the Hosni Mubarak regime. His personal involvement in the torture of individuals on behalf of the CIA, as part of the American “war on terror”, had certainly not yet been made public. But the presence of this chief spy among the clients of Credit Suisse, revealed by the “Switzerland Secrets” investigation, has something to challenge, in view of the amounts that this official and his family have made profitable in the Swiss establishment: up to to 64 million Swiss francs (39 million euros) in 2007.
The Egyptian is just one of many spies identified by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) investigative consortium in Credit Suisse’s client portfolio. The confidential banking data obtained by the Suddeutsche Zeitung as part of the “Swiss Secrets” investigation reveal the existence of some forty accounts opened over the years by senior intelligence service officers around the world, or by members of their families.
Credit Suisse thus offered its services to another key ally of the United States: Sa’ad Khair, who headed the Jordanian intelligence services between 2000 and 2005. Known for having inspired a protagonist in Ridley Scott’s film State lies (2008), this man was also accused by NGOs of having played a leading role in the excesses of the “war on terror” waged by Jordan on behalf of the Americans. His account in Switzerland, opened in 2003, held up to 28.3 million Swiss francs (18 million euros) in 2006, before being closed shortly after his death in 2009. The year of the he opening of the account corresponds to the setting up of contraband oil trafficking between Iraq and Jordan under the supervision of Sa’ad Khair. Contacted, his widow explained that she had no knowledge of the Swiss funds of her late husband.
Espionage Services Financial Hub
“Switzerland Secrets” also reveals that several million Swiss francs circulated in the Credit Suisse account of Ghaleb Al-Qamish, who reigned for three decades over the intelligence services of Yemen – sums incompatible with his official income, estimated at 5,000 dollars per month. He too had close ties to the CIA, collaborating in the hunt for al-Qaeda militants responsible for the bombing of the American ship. USS Cole in the port of Aden in 2000.
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