Adonis Diaries

The Biggest Non-Western Financial Empire BCCI:

The Fall Guy, Agha Hassan Abedi (1922-1995)

From 1972 to 1991, the BCCI ( Bank de Credit et du Commerce International ) was implanted in the 5 continents and owned banking branches in 73 countries.

Just in the USA and Europe, the BCCI ran 400 agencies and headquartered in the heart of the City of London.

It had trust funds, holding societies, off-shores establishments in the Caimans Islands, Switzerland and Luxemburg.

Abedi preached the message: All powerful banks belong to the white Western nations, those immoral oppressors of the Asians and the third world countries. They suck the blood of the credible poor and hard working people around the world. The BCCI will reduce this exploitation and add a moral dimension to the financial business…

The small working people in Pakistan, India and in the countries the BCCI opened branches deposited their meagre savings. 20% of the deposit were retained for banking transactions and the rest were invested.

Abedi facilitated the transfer and whitewashing of all financial criminal activities of drug lords to other State institutions that wanted to bypass regulations.

Born in Lucknow (India) and displaced to Pakistan in 1947 after the partition of India, Hassan starts his banking jobs with Habib Bank in Bombay.

In 1947, over 14 million Moslem Shiaa migrated to Pakistan (called Muhajer) by the local Sind people in south Pakistan. The rivalry between the new comers and the local leaders lasted for decades.

In 1959, he founded his own bank United Bank Limited (UBL) catering for the downtrodden and the rich of all the factions and minorities in the Capital Karachi. Within a decade, UBL became the second largest bank in Pakistan.

Abedi made good money financing both sides in the rivalry and did enormous transactions from the port of Karachi (the third largest in Asia at the time)

Abedi had close links with Nawaz Sherif, sheikh Zayed bin Sultan al Nahyan, and many Saudi princes in Riyadh and Jeddah.

A few months before the oil embargo in 1973 (the war with Israel), Abedi had founded the BCCI with his partner Swaleh Naqvi and registered it in Luxemburg.

Abedi was investing the fortunes of dictators such as Samuel Doe (Liberia), Manuel Noriega (Panama), Mobutu (Congo/Zaire), Gen. Babangida (Nigeria), Alan Garcia (Peru), Saddam Hussein (Iraq), The Emirs of the Gulf States, the Saudi princes…

Abedi transferred funds from Saudi Arabia to the Contra rebels in Nicaragua at the sold of USA Reagan administration because Congress refused any budget for that covert operation.

In the USA, he purchased First American Bankshares, National Bank of Georgia, Independence Bank of California.

During the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Hassan had close ties with the CIA, Pakistan secret services and facilitated the transfer of funds and transport of weapons to Ahmad Chah Massoud, Gulbuddin Hekmatiyar, Karim Khalili…

Clark Clifford, the most influential king maker in the USA was on his sold.

Robert Altman, a powerful lawyer and President of First American Bankshares was his agent.

Hassan was the prime benefactor of associations related to healthcare facilities, (equipped with the latest technology for medical research), public charity associations such as the ICIC (Jimmy Carter Foundation), orphan centers, training centers, hospices, schools…

All of the top hospitals that Abedi funded were located in the USA and Europe, just to increase his standing position. He never cared for establishing any health facility in his own countries or under-developed States.

Ironically, when he had a serious heart attack while visiting Lahore in 1988, there were no valid hospital for reanimation. The respiratory tube available was too large which ruined his vocal chords. His spend the remaining 7 years as an invalid in Yacub’s Harefield Hospital in London.

The BCCI organization was very complex and mainly contained 5 rings for doing business:

1. The actual professional banking directors and employees that were numbered in the thousands

2. The “Shadow Bankers” or “The Bank within the bank” running the criminal and non-regulated financial activities

3. The “Protocol Professionals” who satisfied and facilitated the pleasure and comfort of the principal clients

4. The “entrepreneurs” who invested and ran the acquired businesses

5. The “Black Units” (of about 1,500 professional criminals) with the job of activating terror tactics, eliminating enemies of the high-level clients, the trade and transfer of arms and drugs to main clients.

Where there were transactions to be made during the Cold War, from China, North Korea.. to any place in the world, the BCCI was well organized to handle the job.

As the Berlin Wall fell in 1989, the US decided to have the sole monopoly on financial transactions and the BCCI had to go after it had done its job during the Cold War.

By 1990, all the western nations targeted the BCCI for one reason or another. The Bank de Credit et du Commerce International was declared bankrupt. and over 100,000 creditors lost $12 billion

Ironically, the organization was so complex that financial investigations could not link together how it functioned, but the BCCI had to go.

Note: Extracted from chapters of “Les seigneurs du crime, 1998” by Jean Ziegler