Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free
Bangladesh has approached Britain for help investigating the overseas wealth of allies of former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, as the new government cracks down on members of its ousted autocratic regime.
Ahsan Mansur, the new governor of Bangladesh’s central bank, said the new government is investigating whether Hasina’s regime has diverted at least Tk2tn (£13 billion) from the banking system abroad.
Mansur told the Financial Times he had sought help from Britain, one of several countries where Bangladeshi authorities believe expropriated assets may be held. He said such assets could also be in the US, Singapore and the UAE.
The British government has been “very helpful. The High Commissioner was in my office and provided a lot of technical support,” Mansur said.
In particular, Mansur said Bangladeshi authorities wanted to identify the source of funds used to pay for a £150 million British property portfolio owned by the former Lands Minister in Sheikh Hasina’s government.
He said investigating the assets was “a matter on which we will seek assistance from the UK government to the extent these assets can be recovered”.
British officials confirmed a meeting had taken place but declined to comment on what was discussed.
Elements of Bangladeshi civil society have long accused Sheikh Hasina and members of her government of corruption. The country has strict currency controls that allow citizens to transfer only a few thousand dollars abroad each year.
“A robbery of this magnitude could not have taken place without the Prime Minister’s knowledge,” Mansur said. But he added that the investigation was at a “very early stage”.
Sheikh Hasina fled to India last month, but her whereabouts in the country are unknown and she could not be reached for comment.
The allegations could prove troublesome for the new Labor government of Sir Keir Starmer, whose city minister Tulip Siddiq is Sheikh Hasina’s niece. There has been no suggestion that Siddiq is involved in any wrongdoing. Siddiq did not respond to a request for comment.
Muhammad Yunus, the Nobel Prize-winning economist and interim leader of Bangladesh after a popular uprising last month, also met the British High Commissioner in Dhaka to ask for Britain’s help.
Bangladeshi authorities “will recover the money stolen from Bangladesh and transferred abroad,” said Shafiqul Alam, Yunus’ press secretary. “That is one of the priorities of this government.”
Sheikh Hasina was in power for 20 years in Bangladesh, a country of 170 million people and the world’s second-largest clothing exporter.
Her rule was marred by allegations of election fraud, rights abuses and widespread corruption, leading to the student protests that toppled her government.
Her Awami League party’s overseas wealth of allies has come under extensive scrutiny both in Bangladesh and internationally.
Transparency International UK earlier this year cited the British property portfolio owned by companies linked to former lands minister Saifuzzaman Chowdhury as an example of “unexplained wealth” that authorities should investigate.
An FT review of HM Land Registry and UK Companies House documents found that entities controlled by Chowdhury acquired at least 280 properties for more than £150 million.
The properties have been acquired since 2016 and the majority were purchased between 2019 and 2022, according to Land Registry data. Chowdhury served as Land Minister between 2019 and 2024.
These include the property of the listed Emerson Bainbridge House in Fitzrovia, central London, 61 properties in Tower Hamlets, east London, and the site of a Co-op supermarket in Bristol.
The financing of the UK property purchases is unclear, although the companies have registered costs with Companies House showing mortgage debt was used.
Ajmalul Hossain KC, a lawyer for Chowdhury, said his client “had nothing to hide” and denied stealing anything. He said Chowdhury was a fourth-generation businessman who started accumulating his wealth in the 1990s before entering politics.
The former minister told a press conference earlier this year that his foreign assets came from international business interests.
Hossain added that Awami League members were victims of “witch hunts” by the “unconstitutional” Yunus government. “There is a significant risk that Mr Chowdhury will suffer a miscarriage of justice,” he said.
Mohammad Arafat, Sheikh Hasina’s former deputy information minister, said an investigation would exonerate the former prime minister and her allies.
“Everything [the new government] tries to portray as massive corruption; and they are trying to blame the former Prime Minister,” he said. “It is good that it is done through a fair process. . . They have to prove it.”
The British government said that, in line with its long-standing policy, it would not comment on whether a mutual legal assistance request had been made by authorities in Bangladesh.