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| Property developer Mario Hoffman said he 'owned' Turks and Caicos government - Mario Hoffman pays $238 a year for a 99-year lease on “Crown land” in the Turks and Caicos Islands valued at nearly $8m
Lisa Raye & Michael Misick
Robert Smith
A European property developer alleged to have links to the criminal underworld boasted that he “owned the government” of a British dependency in the Caribbean, an inquiry has been told.
Mario Hoffman pays only $238 (£167) a year for a 99-year lease on “Crown land” in the Turks and Caicos Islands that has a freehold value of nearly $8 million, it is claimed.
The deal was completed with Chal Misick, the brother of the islands' premier, Michael Misick, who is at the centre of the inquiry into claims of political corruption. Mr Hoffman and Chal Misick plan to build a golf and hotel complex on the 238-acre Salt Cay island, the inquiry has been told.
Michael Misick denies granting special immigration status to Mr Hoffman, a Slovakian, but admits that the developer introduced him to a bank director in Prague who was subsequently involved in organising a $1.6 million loan.
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Corruption claims on island paradise
The inquiry has been told that many property deals involving the islands' politicians centred on the sale of undeveloped “Crown land” owned by the government, which requires the approval of the British-appointed governor.
Georgia Dunn, a local businesswoman, told the inquiry that when she refused to sell her land to Mr Hoffman he warned her that she would not receive planning permission as he “owned the government”.
One of Mr Hoffman's companies, Istrokapital, has been described as a conduit for “Russian money” and a front for money laundering.” In written evidence to the Foreign Affairs Select Committee last year, Istrokapital was described as having the “strongest ties to the underworld and is known to draw its muscle from former officers of the Slovak intelligence service”. The allegations are denied by Mr Hoffman and his company.
The inquiry, ordered by the islands' governor and headed by the eminent British judge Sir Robin Auld, has made clear that it is not investigating allegations of wrongdoing against Mr Hoffman.
Over almost five weeks the inquiry has also heard details of a secret bank account, controlled by the leaders of the ruling Progressive National Party, that was used to run up an overdraft of $1.6 million.
Floyd Hall, the islands' deputy premier, said that money from the account was moved to the party's official account and then used to pay stipends for “political endeavours”. Michael Misick received $901,000 over five years and Mr Hall said that he got $355,000.
The deputy premier said that these stipends were used to make small “loans” to constituents that were
not expected to be repaid - a practice described as being common in the Caribbean.
The inquiry also heard that Mr Hall personally lent money for a lucrative property deal to a friend who had been jailed in America for drug-related offences. Alden Smith was given an option to buy ten acres of land for $750,000 but got into financial difficulties and wanted to sell the land immediately, it was claimed.
Mr Hall lent him $75,000 and approached Michael Misick to find a buyer. When the land was sold for $2 million, Mr Hall was repaid his loan plus $125,000 and the premier received $325,000.
Jeffery Hall, another minister in the government and Floyd Hall's cousin, admitted that a professional poker player and a land developer had paid his $200,000 credit card bills. He said he could prove that the money was repayment for an earlier loan.
13.02.2009 www.timesonline.co.uk |
| Obituary: Nina Wang, Hong Kong's pigtailed billionaire - HONG KONG: Hong Kong's richest woman, Nina Wang, known for a sensational legal battle over her missing husband's estate, died on Tuesday, her spokesman said. She was 69.
The spokesman, Ringo Wong, said Wang died from an illness, but he declined to give specifics. Hong Kong newspapers had reported earlier that she suffered from ovarian cancer, and that it had spread to her liver and other organs.
Wang's company, Chinachem Group, Hong Kong's largest private property developer, confirmed that she had died.
Wang, known for her signature pigtails, made headlines in Hong Kong with her legal fight against her father-in-law over the estate of her husband, Teddy Wang.
Teddy Wang was kidnapped in 1990 and declared dead nine years later. His body was never found.
A court ruled in 2002 that a handwritten will Teddy Wang was said to have penned one month before he disappeared was a fake, and that Nina Wang "probably" forged it.
The court named Teddy Wang's father, Wang Din-shin, the sole inheritor of his son's fortune. However, Hong Kong's top court reversed that ruling in 2005, and Nina Wang inherited the estate.
The eight-year legal battle captivated the public with colorful and lurid detail. Wang Din-shin had accused his daughter-in-law of adultery.
This year Forbes magazine ranked Nina Wang among the 35 richest people in Asia and Australia and ranked her No. 204 in the world with a fortune of $4.2 billion.
Reuters, The Associated Press
www.iht.com 7.04.2007 |
| Augusto Pinochet - SANTIAGO (AFP) - Former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, whose brutal 17-year rule became a symbol of Latin American military repression, died at 91, his doctor said.
The former strongman, who had long evaded efforts to bring him to justice for the torture and deaths of thousands during his 1973-1990 rule, died in Santiago's Military Hospital one week after suffering a heart attack, Doctor Juan Ignacio Vergara said.
Scores of jubilant Chileans danced in the streets of Santiago at the news, as people blasted car horns and dozens of revelers assembled in the Plaza Italia, near downtown Santiago.
Some waved Chilean flags and danced for joy at what they called Chile's "liberation" from the last vestiges of the former dictator's control.
Meanwhile there was no official reaction from the government of the United States, which supported his bloody 1973 coup and bolstered his rule.
Pinochet never faced trial for abuses committed under his military regime, including charges laid two weeks ago against him in connection with two disappearances in 1973.
The former general was taken to hospital a week ago while still under house arrest after suffering a heart attack. He underwent an angioplasty and doctors had announced steady improvement up through early Sunday before he took a turn for the worse and died.
His demise ends years of efforts to bring him to justice for the killings of dissidents during his military regime. He avoided prosecution, though, with his lawyers arguing to the Supreme Court that dementia hindered his ability to defend himself.
The latest arrest warrant issued November 27 by judge Victor Montiglio was linked to the disappearance of two security guards of Socialist president Salvador Allende, who committed suicide during the September 1973 military coup.
The guards disappeared during the notorious "Caravan of Death," an operation by pro-Pinochet soldiers to purge opponents shortly after the coup, killing 75 people.
Pinochet's defense team dismissed the charges against their client as false, branding the entire proceedings against him a "political persecution."
Some 3,000 people, by official count, were killed or tortured under Pinochet's regime.
Those tortured at the notorious Villa Grimaldi during his rule included Michelle Bachelet, now president of Chile, along with her mother, for a month in 1975. Bachelet's father, an Allende loyalist, was also tortured, and eventually died in jail.
Pinochet was also charged in connection with Operation Colombo, which spirited the bodies of 119 murdered regime opponents to other South American countries ruled by military regimes in 1975.
Chileans remain deeply divided over the dictatorship, which ended when Pinochet lost a 1988 referendum on his continued rule and handed over power in 1990 to a transitional government.
During Pinochet's 91st birthday celebrations on November 25, his wife read a message saying that the former dictator held "no grudge against anyone," despite all the "persecutions and injustices" against him.
Sunday, Dec. 10, 2006 |
| P. W. Botha - Pieter Willem Botha
Born: 12-Jan-1916
Birthplace: Paul Roux, South Africa
Died: 31-Oct-2006
Location of death: Wilderness, South Africa
Cause of death: unspecified
Gender: Male
Religion: Calvinist [1]
Ethnicity: White
Sexual orientation: Straight
Occupation: Head of State
Nationality: South Africa
Executive summary: President of South Africa 1984-89
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[1] Nederduits Gereformeerde Church.
Wife: Anna Elizabeth Rossouw (m. 1943, d. 1977, two sons, three daughters)
Wife: Barbara Robertson (m. 1998)
University: University of Orange Free State
President of South Africa (1984–89)
Prime Minister of South Africa (1978–84)
South African Minister National Security (1978-84)
South African Minister Defense (1966-80)
South African Minister Community, Public Works, Coloured Affairs (1961-66)
Stroke (1989)
Paralyzed left side of body
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Address : Euro-Brew Ltd., Hlboká 22, 917 01 Trnava, Slovakia
Tel. : +421 33 53 418 53, Fax : +421 33 53 418 52, E-mail : info@eurobrew.sk |
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