Updated
Canada
NRI, Rakesh Saxena extradite to Thailand for embezzled
$88 million from the Bangkok Bank
Vancouver, Nov. 03, 2009
Dalbir Sahota
NRI press
NRI, (non-resident Indian) Rakesh Saxena,
57, a fugitive former adviser to a Thai bank, who
had staged one of the longest extradition battles
in Canadian history to avoid being sent back to face
charges he helped embezzle $88 million from the Bangkok
Bank of Commerce, which collapsed in 1995. The bank
had about $3 billion in bad debt when it was shut
down.
He arrived Friday night in Bangkok after
his extradition from Canada.
NRI,
Rakesh Saxena and the Spiderweb of Crooks, Arms Dealers,
Mercenaries, Politicians
Gaborone/Botswana/Africa,
April 14, 2006
Dr. Alexander von Paleske
Rakesh Saxena is fighting his extradition from Canada
to Thailand for ten years now. Let's have a look at
the spiderweb, of which he is part of.
First to mention is a veteran of arms and shady deals,
a close friend of the bin Laden family for decades,
an uncle of the late Dodi Fayed, the last partner
of Diana Princess of Wales and brother-in-law of the
owner of Harrod's Supermarket in London, Al Fayed,
his name: Adnan Khashoggi, once called the richest
man on earth....Full Story
NRI,
Rakesh Saxena in Canada is MOST WANTED man BY THAILAND
Govt.
He engineered the disappearance of more than $ 300
million from Thailand
Vancouver, Aug 20, 2005
Dalbir Sahota
NRI press
NRI, (non-resident Indian) Rakesh Saxena
is accused of helping bring down a Bangkok bank and
triggering the fall of the baht and the collapse of
the Thai economy. Thai authorities want to extradite
him from Canada. Rakesh Saxena was charged in Thailand
with looting $73.5 million from the Bangkok Bank of
Commerce.
He will appear before the British Columbia
Court of Appeal on September 26, 2005, according to
Department of Justice spokeswoman Lye Canton. Saxena
has said that, if freed, he would apply for residency
in Canada. Rakesh Saxena was a treasurer adviser for
the bank when Thai authorities charged him in May
1996 with setting up phony loans to syphon millions
from the bank. Thai police issued an arrest warrant
for him in June 1996
Saxena's strategy was sufficiently simple;
He would identify stagnant Thai companies that traded
publicly, find their buyers, then pump up their balance
sheets while slimming assets and staff that were not
needed, finally reselling those frims on making profit.
In 1993 and 1994, Krirkkiat, Saxena and their bankers
launched a takeover bid for targets such as Morakot
Industries, a major cooking oil producer, Jalaprathan
Cement, Semiconductor Venture International and Phoenix
Pulp and Paper. In total, 15 companies were attacked.
July 1995, within a three day period, Saxena transferred
more than $80 milion around the world ignoring banking
regulations. In this affair, he colllaborated
with Oleg Boiko, a flamboyant Russian businessman;
the two owned a New York brokerage firm. At that time
Boiko managed the Moscow National Credit Bank. July
7, the US Dollar account number 001-6-10050 was opened
at the BBC under the name National Credit Bank.
In days to follow Saxena produced a bill of exchange
guaranteed by the National Credit Bank under the name
Essex Corporate and Finance, a paper company registered
in the British Cayman Islands controlled by Saxena.
His BBC colleagues applied the standard discount and
received the bill of exchange as collateral. All the
BBC internal usage documents interpolated the seal
"extremely urgent". In less than a week,
$80 million was credited to a National Credit Bank
account. June 11 1995, all the money was withdrawn
and the National Credit Bank account was closed. The
loan was not honoured, according to the bank, the
registered bill of exchange was valueless and the
National Credit Bank is now collapsed.
Warrant lapses, Saxena asks for freedom
Saturday, August 13, 2005
David Baines
Vancouver Su
Time may have run out for Canadian justice department
officials who have been trying for the past decade
to have financial fugitive Rakesh Saxena extradited
to Thailand to answer charges that he embezzled $88
million from the Bangkok Bank of Commerce.
The warrant for Saxena's arrest -- which formed the
basis for his extradition proceeding -- contained
a 10-year limitation clause.
On June 20 this year, the limitation period quietly
expired, a development that Saxena views as a get-out-of-jail-free
card.
"The warrant that started the whole proceeding
has expired," he said in an interview Friday
from his Richmond residence, where he is under house
arrest. "On that basis alone, the extradition
proceeding should be quashed."
Since he was arrested by the RCMP in July 1996, Saxena
has thrown up every possible legal objection to his
extradition, including a claim that he would be murdered
by Thai authorities if he was returned to that country.
There have also been lengthy delays at the judicial
and ministerial levels.
Saxena's original extradition hearing was the longest
in Canadian history and, even after the presiding
judge ruled there were grounds to extradite him, it
took the federal justice minister more than three
years to order his return to Thailand.
Saxena has appealed both the ministerial and judicial
decisions. The B.C. Court of Appeal is scheduled to
hear both matters starting Sept. 26.
Saxena -- who has been implicated in a series of
dubious stock schemes and a counter-coup in Sierra
Leone while under house arrest in Vancouver -- says
he is confident he will win the appeal. And if he
does, he says he will apply for Canadian residency.
"I'd like to stay here," he said.
But federal prosecutor Roger McMeans has other ideas.
"I can tell you that all the matters he is raising
will be fully canvassed in argument before the court
of appeal," he said Friday.
Friday was a Thai national holiday, so Thai consular
officials could not be reached for comment.
Saxena's troubles began in May 1996, when Thai authorities
charged Saxena, who had been working as treasurer
adviser for the Bangkok Bank of Commerce, with setting
up a series of phoney loans to siphon millions from
the bank.
Thai police issued a warrant for his arrest on June
5, 1996. The following month, RCMP officers -- acting
at the behest of the Thai government -- arrested him
in Whistler and hustled him off to jail.
Saxena argues that the warrant, because it was issued
by Thai police rather than a judge, is not legally
valid in Canada.
Saxena was released on bail, but that bail was revoked
in January 1998 after he allegedly tried to obtain
a phoney passport and threatened a witness.
Several months later, he persuaded then-B .C. Supreme
Court judge Wally Oppal (now B.C.'s attorney general)
to allow him to move into a luxury False Creek condo,
where he would be guarded by private security guards
at his own expense. RCMP officers "visibly bristled"
at the decision, according to a Vancouver Sun report.
His extradition hearing began in October 1996 before
B.C. Supreme Court judge Frank Maczko. Four years
later, after what Maczko described as the longest
and most difficult extradition case in Canadian history,
the judge determined there were grounds to return
Saxena to Thailand. Now it was up to the federal justice
minister to order his extradition.
Meanwhile, the Thai government revised its constitution
to invalidate all warrants that were not issued by
a judge, effective 2002. While the federal justice
minister was pondering his decision, the effective
date passed. "So technically, they can't arrest
me if I land in Thailand today," Saxena contends.
In November 2003 -- more than three years after Maczko's
decision -- then-federal justice minister Martin Cauchon
ordered Saxena to surrender to Thai authorities. "There
is a compelling case against Mr. Saxena," the
minister said at the time.
Saxena acknowledges that the Canadian public will
probably interpret his attempts to defeat the government's
extradition efforts as stall tactics.
"The general perception is that I have dragged
the case out. That's what the MPs will say. But that's
like a fairy tale you tell your kids when they go
to sleep. I say Canada has held me illegally for 10
years. This whole case is a fraud.
"I'm not mincing any words here. Most Canadians
are ignorant about how things work in the third world.
They turn a blind eye to the corruption. If they don't
know the facts, they should shut up."
In any event, he said, "I don't understand why
the Canadian public is worried. I have not committed
a crime in Canada, and I'm not costing them a cent."
However, Saxena has became involved in several schemes
to promote dubious stocks on the perilous OTC Bulletin
Board and the even more risky "pink sheets"
in the United States. Most of these ventures have
ended badly for investors.
In June, the Sun reported that, from 2001 to 2003,
Saxena arranged for overseas boiler room operators,
some with prior criminal records, to sell shares of
essentially worthless companies to investors, most
located in the United Kingdom.
Investors were told to send their money "in
trust" to Martin & Associates, a Vancouver
law firm. According to a forensic report filed in
B.C. Supreme Court, investors sent $18.4 million to
the law firm, most of which was distributed to third
parties on Saxena's instructions.
In many cases, investors did not get their shares.
In other cases, investors got their shares only to
discover they were not listed on any exchange or had
virtually no value.
In October 2003, after receiving complaints from
investors, the B.C. Law Society took over the law
practice. In July 2004, the two principals, Jack Martin
and Craig Iwata, admitted to numerous trust account
irregularities and agreed not to reapply to practise
law for 10 years.
Saxena, while admitting he helped organize the scheme,
insists he was strictly an intermediary and not party
to any of the contractual arrangements. "It's
a thin red line, I grant you, but it's still a red
line."
But these sorts of activities, including a counter-coup
attempt in Sierra Leone which he plotted while under
arrest in Vancouver, have generated reams of adverse
publicity for Canada.
Several days ago, the Botswana Sunday Standard described
Saxena as a "financial regulators' worst nightmare"
and accused him of orchestrating a stock scheme that
"threatens investors' confidence in Botswana"
while under house arrest in Canada.
Sep 1999
A P Kamath
Invoking Buddha, Rakesh Saxena's Lawyer Tries
To Keep Him Away From 'Lynching' Mob In Thailand
Russ Chamberlain, the flamboyant Vancouver attorney,
is well-known for handling high profile cases.
But Rakesh Saxena, Chamberlain's most controversial
client, towers abovethe likes of Johal. For the 48-year-old
trader reportedly embezzled $ 88 million from the
Bangkok Bank of Commerce, triggering the fall of the
baht and the collapse of the Thai economy.
Chamberlain is working overtime to make sure that
his client is not extradited to Thailand. Saxena has
said he fears he will be lynched in Thailand as the
government wants to make him the fall guy for the
failures of its bankers and politicians.
This week, Chamberlain invoked Buddha in telling
the Supreme Court in Vancouver that the affidavits
of Thai witnesses are not valid because the witnesses
were not sworn before Buddha as the law in Thailand
requires.
Chamberlain told the court on Monday that the new
affidavits the Thai government is offering should
also be invalidated. The Thai government says the
new affidavits will confirm that the original witness
statements were taken under proper oath, but the attorney
is not convinced.
Saxena, who fled Thailand just as the Asian crisis
was unwrapping, was arrested in Canada four years
ago, He has been fighting his extradition since then,
living in a highly wired apartment that cost him nearly
Canadian $ 500,000 He spends over $ 45,000 a month
for security guards who accompany him to the court
and to his lawyer.
Chamberlain is questioning the validity of the documents
in Supreme Court Justice Frank Macsko's court.
Saxena is accused of siphoning $ 88 million to the
City Trading Corporation in the Cayman Islands, but
he rejects the charge that he and his friends owned
CTC. On the other hand, he asserts it was controlled
by the Bangkok Bank of Commerce which made the loan,
but the loan never left the bank The bank, he claims,
was trying to hide its own chaos and was avoiding
a bankruptcy situation. While it hoped the economy
would bounce back, just the opposite happened, Saxena
says.
Though Saxena is out on bail, the court has put severe
restrictions on his movement; he is electronically
monitored, and since he is ordered to stay away from
alcohol, there are surprise sobriety tests he must
take.
Bangkok newspapers have published reports linking
many Thai politicians to the scandal, and Saxena says
he feels he would be killed to maintain his silence.
Bangkok newspapers alleged that Saxena identified
ailing Thai companies, start investing in them, got
them reorganized and helped sell them for substantial
profits.
The news accounts paint him as a scheming, relentlessly
ambitious man who began pilfering the Bangkok Bank
in a big way in 1995. There are suggestions he engineered
the disappearance of more than $ 300 million from
Thailand into the accounts held by him and his friends.
When the bill of exchange for the $ 88 million loan
was found useless, banks collapsed, Thai newspapers
say and the confidence in the baht was shaken. The
financial crisis not only hit Thailand but a number
of Asian countries.
He settled down in Thailand in 1985 when that country
was going through a big boom and endeared himself
to publishers, bankers and politicians there.
Aug 01, 1999
THE ROYAL CANADIAN MOUNTED Police officers bristled
visibly in the heavily guarded Vancouver court when
the controversial ruling was handed down. Thousands
of kilometers away in Bangkok, their counterparts in
the Royal Thai Police would express outrage and disbelief.
Justice Wally Oppal of the British Columbia Supreme
Court had just allowed Thailand's most wanted man, Rakesh
Saxena, to continue fighting extradition to Bangkok
from the comfort of his luxury Vancouver condominium
- watched by his own guards. Saxena's exuberant lawyer
Russ Chamberlain turned to his India-born client and
cautioned: "Don't smile too much. There will be
no dancing ladies, but there will be mother's cooking."
Saxena, clad in a navy golf shirt, grinned in the prisoner's
box surrounded on three sides by bullet-proof glass
and scrutinized by sheriffs. He was adamant he would
not voluntarily return to Thailand. "I'm afraid
with good reason that I will be killed extra-judicially
should I set foot in Thailand," he told the court.
The June 24 ruling, the first of its kind in Canada,
overturned a February decision to revoke Saxena's bail
because he was a flight risk. At the time, Saxena languished
in the spartan segregation unit of the city's remand
center. Months of incarceration had rendered the stocky,
hard-drinking, gregarious braggart into a surly, sober,
1.6-meter lightweight. "Someone should try living
like this," Saxena complained. He had only a cot
and a small coffee table in his cell. "To turn
on the lights you have to call for the guard who may
or may not be there," he said. He wasn't given
even a pencil, pen or pad.
Today Saxena lives in Suite 206-1600 Hornby Street,
his spacious $500,000 condo in Yacht Harbour Pointe,
overlooking expensive pleasure craft moored in False
Creek. To keep him from wandering, his lawyer's firm
has hired Intercon Security at $27,000 a month.
