Keeping an eye on Communist, Totalitarian China, and its influence both globally, and we as Canadians. I have come to the opinion that we are rarely privy to truth regarding the real goal, the agenda of Red China, and it's implications for Canada [and North America as a whole]. No more can we rely on our media as more and more information on China is actively being swept under the carpet - not for consumption.
Thursday, February 2, 2023
Property grab: AFP smashes $10 billion Chinese money-laundering operation
Property grab: AFP smashes $10 billion Chinese money-laundering operation
February 2, 2023
Federal agents have dismantled a Chinese-Australian money laundering organisation that moved an estimated $10 billion offshore while amassing a blue-chip property portfolio comprising Sydney mansions, a luxury city building and hundreds of acres of land near Sydney’s second airport.
On Wednesday, Australian Federal Police officers seized properties and luxury assets worth at least $150 million and arrested and charged nine suspects, including two alleged Chinese-Australian gangsters in Sydney with a combined personal fortune estimated at more than $1 billion. The arrests bring to an end a property-buying spree that one official source said included land purchased for a new Sydney suburb owned and developed by Chinese organised crime near Sydney’s new international airport.
Federal police arrest a man in Sydney as they dismantle a money-laundering syndicate.
The arrests bring to an end a property-buying spree that one official source said included land purchased for a new Sydney suburb owned and developed by Chinese organised crime near Sydney’s new international airport.
The landmark AFP operation uncovered an industrial-scale shadow-banking organisation that stretched from Australia to China, the Caribbean, Switzerland, America and the United Arab Emirates, and which facilitated the purchase of Australian real estate that police sources suggest might be worth billions. The syndicate, alleged to be responsible for the money laundering, was deemed to be such a risk to the national interest it was designated an Australian Priority Organisation Target by the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission last year.
The AFP operation, and the fact that the organisation targeted is just one of several large money-laundering syndicates operating in Australia, will raise fresh questions about the role of foreign funds in inflating the nation’s property market and other legislative and policy gaps in the financial and migration systems that continue to be exploited by criminals.
Police have also seized cryptocurrency and are examining how the syndicate used crypto exchanges to transfer tainted funds around the world without drawing the attention of authorities, according to confidential sources with knowledge of the investigation.
One of those arrested, Steven Xin, is the local business partner of fallen global casino industry tycoon, Alvin Chau, who was sensationally jailed in Macau last week after being exposed in Australian media reports and casino commissions of inquiry as having links to money laundering and organised crime.
Xin and his co-accused, Zhaohua Ma, are facing accusations they accumulated their wealth by becoming the Australian-based bankers of choice for international drug cartels and wealthy Chinese nationals seeking to circumvent the Communist Party’s capital-flight laws.
Also arrested and charged in Sydney was a mid-ranking employee of the National Australia Bank, Chen Zhang. Others charged include an accountant and a lawyer.
The NAB worked closely with the federal police and is one of several of the big four banks, along with second and third-tier lenders, to be targeted by the syndicate.
The NAB worked closely with the federal police and is one of several of the big four banks, along with second and third-tier lenders, to be targeted by the syndicate.
The alleged transnational crime organisation, known as the Xin Money Laundering Organisation (MLO), exploited Australia’s migration system, with a senior syndicate figure being granted a significant-investor visa and another receiving Australian citizenship despite being a wanted fugitive. A third suspected syndicate member is a former federal government registered migration agent who facilitates visas for Chinese nationals.
The Albanese government has already appointed former Victorian police commissioner Christine Nixon to investigate the exploitation of Australia’s migration system by criminals, after this masthead and 60 Minutes revealed how human trafficking, worker exploitation and drug syndicates were rorting the nation’s visa programs.
The alleged role of a lawyer and ex migration agent, and, an accountant in the Xin MLO’s operation, as well as its property purchases, will ramp up pressure on the federal government to introduce long-stalled “Tranche 2” laws. The laws would force accountants, real estate agents and lawyers to face the same obligations as bankers and casinos to report suspected money laundering.
The ease with which the syndicate bought property also raises questions about the adequacy of the Foreign Investment Review Board in safeguarding Australian real estate and businesses from tainted overseas money.
Sam Boarder, who runs the national security practice at McGrathNicol Advisory, said the booming operations of transnational organised crime had increased the urgency of proceeding with Tranche 2 reforms to anti-money-laundering laws.
The transnational crime organisation, known as the Xin Money Laundering Organisation (MLO), exploited Australia’s migration system, with a senior syndicate figure being granted a significant-investor visa and another receiving Australian citizenship despite being a wanted fugitive. A third suspected syndicate member is a former federal government registered migration agent who facilitates visas for Chinese nationals.
The Albanese government has already appointed former Victorian police commissioner Christine Nixon to investigate the exploitation of Australia’s migration system by criminals, after this masthead and 60 Minutes revealed how human trafficking, worker exploitation and drug syndicates were rorting the nation’s visa programs.
“Criminal syndicates are working around our existing countermeasures”, he said.
“The national security risks from these criminal operations are immense, particularly if entangled with foreign government-backed influence platforms. The democratic world is still coming to terms with these massive flows of ‘grey’ unregulated capital, which distort our real estate markets and introduce vulnerabilities into our economic and financial systems.”
A shadow bank is born
The origins of the Xin MLO lie in tycoon Alvin Chau’s SunCity casino junket business, which gained infamy after this masthead and 60 Minutes exposed its involvement in large-scale money laundering at Australian casinos and its links to the Chinese triads, which are secretive and powerful criminal organisations.
The media exposure in 2019 and 2020, and subsequent scrutiny by various casino commissions of inquiry, led to the collapse of SunCity’s Australian operations.
But one of SunCity’s key lieutenants, Steven Xin, pivoted from the casino trade to a service that allowed high-wealth Chinese nationals to shift funds into Australia and other attractive overseas investment destinations in defiance of China’s capital-flight laws.
The AFP alleges Xin, who fled China, where he is wanted for running an illegal gambling enterprise, obtained Australian citizenship and partnered with Chinese businessman Zhouhua Ma to provide this service.
The pair won the trust of international drug cartels and other crime syndicates seeking another service: the movement of dirty cash – that was earned in countries such as Australia – to China or other offshore locations.
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