Why Journalism Matters
Europe's first ever Chief Prosecutor praises investigative journalists for fighting crime. Google reviews from one of the world's most wanted crime bosses. Israel condemned for closing Al Jazeera
5 minute read
Europe’s crusading female prosecutor values the importance of investigative journalism, and the role of citizens and whistleblowers
“…In these situations, we rely mostly on journalists, on citizens and on whistleblowers to report cases. They can help us. We assess all the information we receive very well. And we also follow all the articles, especially from those journalists that do investigations.”
In producing this newsletter we often discuss revelations about the impact of crime and corruption, depriving societies of much needed investment funding that could transform lives.
It is estimated by the United Nations that corruption costs the world about $3.6 trillion dollars every year. This figure includes bribes paid out and money stolen and amounts to 5 per cent of the world economy.
The victims of this corruption are frequently the poorest in society, but it’s not just about money. Corruption is often the root cause of mass migration, human rights abuses, poverty and untimely death.
It’s also worth reminding ourselves that corruption is not restricted to poor and underdeveloped parts of the world. It is estimate that the EU loses €160 billion every year due to corruption and organised crime .
But Laura Kövesi, the recently appointed Chief prosecutor of the European Public Prosecutors Office (EPPO) is determined to do something about it, and has shown she doesn’t mind who she upsets in the process.
(The EPPO investigates crimes against the EU budget and brings cases to national courts.)
Laura Kövesi is under no illusion about the uphill struggle she faces and she has paid her dues to get to her current position. She learned the hard way as chief prosecutor in her native Romania where she took on investigations of several high profile officials and politicians including the then Prime Minister Victor Ponta. There was a great deal of criticism of her in the media and she was ultimately dismissed as head of the Romanian Anti-Corruption Directorate despite protests. She was later exonerated by the European Court of Human Rights.
In a recent interview with the investigative outlet Follow the Money she revealed her absolute commitment to enforcing the law and making the best use of civil society organisations, investigative journalism and related activism.
“The scale of fraud affecting the financial interests of the EU, in particular on the revenue side of the budget, can only be explained by the heavy involvement of serious organised crime groups,” she warned.
“In our investigations, we see serious organised crime groups financing VAT fraud operations with money obtained from their other criminal activities. We see the same specialised operators laundering money from VAT fraud and the other criminal activities of these groups. Our strategy should be to cripple the financial capacity of the serious organised crime groups.”
Headquarters in Luxembourg
The EPPO, headquartered in Luxembourg with branch offices in 22 other EU countries only began investigating and prosecuting misuse of EU funds in 2021. But it has already investigated misconduct in EU states relating to agricultural subsidies, Covid recovery grants as well as VAT and customs fraud.
In its latest annual report, covering 2023, the EPPO had mounted 1,927 active investigations looking into an overall estimated damage to the EU budget of €19.2 billion – 59% of which (€11.5 billion, corresponding to 339 investigations) was linked to serious, cross-border VAT fraud.
In her interview Kövesi dismissed criticisms that were made by the European Parliament and Commission about the level of fraud within the EU.
“After three years of operations, we saw that the entire architecture that has been put in place to prevent fraud and to recover the money can be improved. The EPPO can’t do that. Recovering money is the responsibility of the Commission and of the national authorities.
Too risky
“We saw in our cases that the mafia and the criminal groups have recently reshuffled their activity. Drug trafficking is too risky because of the long prison sentences. So they started financial fraud, such as VAT fraud and fraud related to EU funds. The members of those criminal groups think that these are ‘risk free’ sectors. It’s just a matter of finding a good accountant, a good lawyer, and someone who knows how to talk and you can make big money.
“The more money these criminals can make laundering, the more powerful they grow, the more aggressive they become. As levels of crime and violence rise, the more expensive it becomes for society.”
One issue that has arisen is that EU institutions like the European Parliament have appeared to be slow in coming forward with fraud cases as they are obliged to do.
“That’s very difficult. In these situations, we rely mostly on journalists, on citizens and on whistleblowers to report cases. They can help us. We assess all the information we receive very well. And we also follow all the articles, especially from those journalists that do investigations.”
And does she think she has shaken things up and made progress in the war against crime and corruption?
“I don't know if you will take this seriously or as a joke, but ever since I was appointed, I lost a lot of friends because of our investigations. But okay. We are here to protect the money of the European people. We are paid to do investigations and to do our job. And this is what we are doing. Sometimes we receive support, sometimes we don't.
“The only thing that matters for us is to win the hearts and the trust of the citizens. We can only do that if we are honest and if we perform well, and if we can prove that the law is equal for everybody.”
Reference
Follow the Money: The EU’s first public prosecutor
4 minute read
Investigating the ‘Dapper Don’ crime lord through Google Reviews of luxury hotels and restaurants
Here’s some helpful advice to members of international narco criminal gangs: Don’t leave Google reviews or other comments and photos of restaurants, tourist destinations or various public amenities if you don’t want investigators to find out where you are and what you are doing.
Such has been the case for the notorious Kinahan gang, originally based in Ireland, but now hiding out from justice in Dubai. It is headed up by Christopher Kinahan Sr (known as the Dapper Don because of his stylish dress sense). He is wanted by law enforcement authorities in the US, Ireland and mainland Europe.
The Kinahans and their consumer preferences have been the subject of persistent and innovative scrutiny via their online reviews by Bellingcat, the open-source investigative unit headquartered in the Netherlands, working in collaboration with the Sunday Times in the UK .
(The collaborative investigative feature is written collectively by John Mooney Beau Donelly Connor Plunkett, and Peter Barth)
Most wanted
So, who are the Kinahans?
Says Bellingcat: “Christy Kinahan is one of the world’s most wanted men, a notorious narco kingpin whose gang is implicated in drug dealing, arms smuggling and multiple murders. Since fleeing to Dubai in 2016 he has left a trail of Google reviews providing valuable new insights into his movements and whereabouts.”
Although Kinahan heads up the gang, his two sons Daniel and Christopher Jr are also heavily involved. All three are now believed to reside in Dubai although the wealthy UAE state so far has refused to extradite them.
Irish police believe the gang has amassed profits of over $USD 1 billion through the trade of illegal narcotics, arms trafficking and money laundering over the years.
According to the Sunday Times “They[the Kinahans] work with the cocaine cartels of South America, jihadists in Asia and, more recently, Iran and Russia’s intelligence services. The United States has imposed sanctions on Kinahan’s organisation and is offering a collective reward of $15 million for the capture of its members, such is the level of threat they pose.”
The US treasury department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control and Drug Enforcement Administration, Ireland’s Garda Siochana, the UK’s National Crime Agency and Europol all announced sanctions and a $USD 5 million bounty on each of the Kinahans in April 2022.
Luxurious trips
Until taking up residence in Dubai Kinahan Sr used the Christopher Vincent alias on a LinkedIn account which posted reviews. Now it appears that the owner of an identically named profile has been ‘freely posting’ Google Reviews since 2019, highlighting luxurious international trips across the globe to Spain, Hungary, Turkey, The Netherlands, Hong Kong, Egypt, Zimbabwe and South Africa, as well as extensive reviews of restaurants and facilities in Dubai.
According to the Sunday Times report, Kinahan has established himself as a ‘prolific Google reviewer’.
“His profile has earned more than 10,000 points, obtaining a “level 7” guide rating. He has rated everything from luxury hotels and rooftop bars to government offices and Covid-19 test centres. He even reviewed a Waitrose [supermarket outlet]. His Google Maps entries — more than 200 reviews and ratings, 1,100 photographs, and four videos — log a mix of “business” meetings and family outings. They began in April 2019, three years before his cartel attracted international notoriety when the US imposed sanctions on its leadership.”
Tellingly, no reviews for locations outside of the UAE have been posted since the US wanted notice was announced in April, 2022.
Last year, Kinahan Sr posted a review of The Cycle Bistro Jumeirah in Dubai. “Service was good and the staff were pleasant and helpful,” he wrote. “The menu caters for NON-vegan, dairy and sugar.”
“I had the açai bowl, followed by eggs with almond bread and green salad. My meal was well presented and tasty. I give this establishment five stars.” A number of photos accompanied the March 2023 post, showing the cafe which is situated within a larger bike store.
“But it was an image that appeared on the establishment’s own social pages a few months later that was most compelling, inadvertently appearing to show a meeting between Kinahan Sr and Christopher Kinahan Jr on a return visit.
“Others show a man of Kinahan Sr’s build and profile even though his face is not fully visible. For example, a picture tagged to the Hyatt Regency Barcelona Tower in Barcelona, Spain, in October 2021 shows an individual with a similar hairstyle and stature to Kinahan Sr reflected in a bathroom mirror.”
No free press
Why does Dubai harbour criminals like the Kinahans? Jodi Vitorri of the Carnegie Endowment centre in Washington, an expert on the linkages of corruption, state fragility and illicit finance has an explanation:
“The UAE has set itself up as a one-stop-shop for a variety of economic activities. It is hard to say exactly why the UAE tolerates the presence of such well-known criminals. The lack of transparency, accountability, civil society, or a free press mean that much of the decision-making in the UAE is a black box.”
Reference
Sunday Times: On the trail of the Kinehans
4 minute read
Israel condemned by both leading journalism NGOs for closing down Al Jazeera’s operations
The worlds two leading journalist NGOs have roundly condemned Israel’s decision to shut down the Al Jazeera channel.
Reporters Without Borders (RSF) based in Paris calls for the repeal of a newly adopted Israeli law that would allow the government to shut down foreign media in Israel, targeting Al Jazeera in particular. Citing Al Jazeera as one of the last international media outlets able to report from Gaza since October 7, RSF describes the Israeli action as unacceptable.
“The terror channel Al Jazeera will no longer broadcast from Israel,” Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu announced in a post on X after the Knesset, the Israeli parliament, passed a law by 71 votes to 10 on April 1 allowing the government to temporally ban “foreign broadcast networks deemed a national security risk,. This includes closing their bureaux in Israel, seizing their equipment and blocking access to their websites.
RSF accuses Israel of trying to ‘use every possible method to try to silence Al Jazeera for its coverge of the reality of the fate of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza since October 7.
“Such censorship legislation under the guise of democratic regulation implicitly targeting a specific media outlet creates a precedent fraught with dangers for journalism in Israel,” said Jonathan Dagher, Head of RSF’s Middle East desk.
He added: “RSF demands that the Israeli authorities end their aggressive harassment of Al Jazeera. Such censorship legislation, under the guise of democratic regulation, implicitly targeting a specific media outlet, creates a precedent fraught with dangers for journalism in Israel.”
103 journalists
Since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas, at least 103 journalists have been killed in Gaza by Israeli strikes, including at least 22 in the course of their work. Three of them worked for Al Jazeera. The journalist Hamza al-Dahdouh – the son of Wael al-Dahdouh, Al Jazeera’s bureau chief in Gaza – and his colleague Moustafa Thuraya, were killed by an Israeli strike at the start of January.
“They are taking revenge on us [the Gazan journalists] by killing our children, but that will not stop us,” Wael al-Dahdouh said at the time. A month later, this leading journalist was himself injured by an Israeli strike that killed Al Jazeera cameraman Samer Abu Daqqa. In South Lebanon, Al Jazeera correspondent Carmen Joukhadar was one of the six journalists injured in an Israeli strike on 13 October that killed Reuters reporter Issam Abdallah.
Long before October 7 Israel has inflicted terrible losses on Palestinian journalists. It is estimated that at least 45 jouralists have been killed by Israeli security forces in the West Bank since 2000. No one has been tried or faced any punishment as a result of these killings.
Al Jazeera’s internationally renowned West Bank correspondent Shireen Abu Akleh was shot dead by an Israeli sniper while reporting in Jenin on May 11 2022.
A year before that, in May 2021, RSF filed a complaint with the International Criminal Court after Israel air strikes destroyed around 20 media outlets in the Gaza Strip, including the Al Jazeera bureau.
Meanwhile, the Committee to Protect Journalists based in New York called on the Israeli government not to close the Jerusalem-based bureau of the Qatari broadcaster and allow the media to report freely on news events in Israel and Gaza during the current conflict.
“CPJ is deeply concerned by new legislation authorising the Netanyahu government to shutter Al-Jazeera in Israel,” said Carlos Martínez de la Serna, CPJ’s program director.
“The law grants the government the power to close any foreign media outlets operating in Israel, posing a significant threat to international media within the country. This contributes to a climate of self-censorship and hostility toward the press, a trend that has escalated since the Israel-Gaza war began.”
On November 12, Israel’s security cabinet approved an order shutting down the Lebanon-based broadcaster and Hezbollah-affiliated Al-Mayadeen TV in Israel.
Since the start of the October 7 war, Al-Jazeera journalists in Gaza have been killed, injured, threatened, and assaulted, and their family members were killed after receiving threats from IDF officers.
This move against Al Jazeera follows the death of international aid workers in an Israeli air raid on Gaza in early April.
Reference
RSF report on Al Jazeera closure
CPJ urges Israel not to shut down Al Jazeera
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