"A cryptocurrency backed by one of Nigel Farage's biggest donors has been used to help Russia fight its war against Ukraine, British investigators say. The National Crime Agency has spent four years trying to crack a multibillion-dollar scheme that exchanges cash from drug and gun sales in the UK for crypto, digital tokens that are designed to hide their identities. The scheme has enabled sanctions evasions and the highest levels of organised crime, including providing money-laundering services to the Russian state, the agency says."
"Of the $24m (18.3m) in crypto that the NCA and its counterparts abroad have so far been able to seize, the vast majority was issued by Tether. A private company headquartered in El Salvador, Tether has grown so popular that it declared profits of $13bn for 2024, one-and-a-half times those of McDonald's. Tether's shares are reportedly owned by a small group, among them Christopher Harborne, one of the UK's biggest political donors."
"In 2019-20, as the UK was leaving the EU, Harborne gave 10m to Nigel Farage's Brexit party, since renamed Reform UK. In January, Farage accepted another 28,000 from Harborne to attend Donald Trump's inauguration as president the month after the US placed sanctions on the Russian bosses of the laundering networks and publicly warned they were using Tether. Reform UK, the first British political party to accept donations in crypto, did not respond to a request for comment."
The National Crime Agency spent four years investigating a multibillion-dollar scheme exchanging cash from UK drug and gun sales for cryptocurrencies designed to hide users' identities. The scheme enabled sanctions evasion and high-level organised crime, including money-laundering services to the Russian state. Of $24m seized so far, the vast majority was issued by Tether. Tether, a private company headquartered in El Salvador, reported $13bn profits for 2024 and is reportedly owned by a small group including Christopher Harborne. Harborne donated millions to UK political causes and provided crypto-linked contributions to political figures.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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