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The British National Crime Agency has frozen more than 300 British property worth around £ 185 million to the former Minister of Bangladesh, because the South Asian country wants to reclaim billions of dollars that are reportedly removed by the deposited regime of Sheikh Hasina.
The NCA said on Thursday that the 342 real estate had frozen with a combined purchase price of approximately £ 185 million after ordering on 5 June was granted orders by the Supreme Court in London.
The property is owned or linked to Saifuzzaman Chowdhury, Minister of Land of Bangladesh under Sheikh Hasina, according to a person with knowledge of the situation.
The NCA freezing assignments mark one of the greatest seizure of assets executed by the office and include a high-end ownership in the St John’s Wood Area in North London, the person said.
They also mark one of the best profile developments that still in the efforts of Bangladesh leader Muhammad Yunus to detect foreign assets whose interim administration claims that they were purchased with money that was taken out of the country under Sheikh Hasina, whose authoritarian rule was overthrown last year.
“We can confirm that the NCA has protected freezing assignments against a number of properties as part of an ongoing civil investigation,” said the agency on Thursday.
Freezing assignments prevent a person from selling or throwing them away while an investigation is underway. The attack was first reported by Al Jazeera.
Chowdhury, his lawyer and two family members did not immediately respond to requests for comments.
Yunus, whose interim government cooperates with overseas authorities to try to recover money from Bangladesh under the Hasina regime, was in the UK for the first time this week since he became a leader.
Ahsan Mansur, head of Yunus’s Asset Recovery Task Force, and Chief Anti-corruption Commission Chief Abdul Moms met the NCA in London on Wednesday.
“I have to say that the progress on the British front is very encouraging for us,” Mansur told the Financial Times. “They have good sources of information and we also support their actions … We hope that more actions will be taken by the British authorities.”
A white paper commissioned by the Yunus administration last year estimated that around $ 234 billion was washed from Bangladesh during the rule of Hasina, which lasted between 2009 and August 2024.
Mansur and Yunus claim that the government officials of Hasina and their allies have transferred money from the banking system with fraudulent loans or too much, or burned money from large ticket infrastructure projects.
Supporters of the party of Hasina, the Awami League, which was formally forbidden from all activities in Bangladesh last month, accused the new administration of the pursuit of political vendettas in her performance against alleged corruption by the old regime.
In 2019, the NCA provided a settlement of £ 190 million – at the time the largest of its kind – with one of the richest business people in Pakistan, Malik Riaz Hussain, after accusations that the agency did not announce, led to freezing promises on its assets. The assets include a central country house on 1 Hyde Park Place.
Additional reporting by Susannah Savage