Press Release: Panama Papers: HSBC lobbies for Syria’s poster boy of corruption, then closes accounts of ordinary Syrian nationals

We issued a press release on 8 April in light of recent findings of the Panama Papers pertaining to Syria. These papers reveal that HSBC, which has long been accused of arbitrarily closing the bank accounts of Syrian nationals, lobbied to maintain the Swiss bank accounts of Syria’s icon of corruption, Rami Makhlouf, after he had been sanctioned by both the US and the EU. Makhlouf is the first cousin of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad and allegedly controls approximately sixty percent of Syria’s economy. We are calling for a Parliamentary enquiry into banks' discriminatory treatment of Syrian nationals and charitable organisations.