August 18 - 24, 2012
World News
British Bank in $340 Million Settlement for Laundering
Standard Chartered, the British bank, has agreed to pay New York’s top banking regulator $340 million to settle claims that it laundered hundreds of billions of dollars in tainted money for Iran and lied to regulators. The agreement is a victory for Benjamin M. Lawsky and his 10-month old agency, the New York Department of Financial Services, which took on the bank alone in charging that it schemed for nearly a decade with Iran to hide from regulators 60,000 transactions worth $250 billion. Some federal authorities worry the deal has the potential to undercut a sweeping settlement between the bank and federal regulators, including the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department. They are also investigating Standard Chartered, a 150-year-old bank based in London with operations across the globe. The $340 million deal is a huge amount for a single state regulator, and it falls near the middle of the collective settlements that the Justice Department and the Manhattan district attorney have reached with other global banks in recent years over money laundering charges, from $619 million with ING bank in June to $298 million with Barclays
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in 2010. Standard Chartered has maintained that only $14 million of the $250 billion in transactions violated federal regulations. In a statement announcing the settlement, Mr. Lawsky said, “The parties have agreed that the conduct at issue involved transactions of at least $250 billion.” The bank said in a regulatory filing Tuesday that “a formal agreement containing the detailed terms of the settlement is expected to be concluded shortly.” Standard Chartered “continues to engage constructively with the other relevant U.S. authorities. The timing of any resolution will be communicated in due course,” the filing said. After frantic negotiations with Mr. Lawsky’s office, which threatened to revoke the bank’s state license at a hearing scheduled for Wednesday, Standard Chartered made a calculation to settle, in part, to resolve the public relations headache, according to people briefed on the matter. The agreement ends a weeklong international drama that thrust the upstart regulator into the spotlight and pitted Mr. Lawsky against federal authorities who thought he was overstepping his bounds and British authorities who accused him of tarnishing the reputation of their banks.
Israel ‘prepared for 30-day war with Iran’ ISRAEL’S outgoing home front defence minister says an attack on Iran would likely trigger a monthlong conflict that would leave 500 Israelis dead. Matan Vilnai told the Maariv newspaper that the fighting would be “on several fronts”, with hundreds of missiles fired at Israeli towns and cities. Israel was prepared, he said, though strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities had to be co-ordinated with the US. Meanwhile, a US blogger has published what he says are Israel’s attack plans. Richard Silverstein told the BBC he had been given an internal briefing memo for Israel’s eightmember security cabinet, which outlined what the Israeli military would do to prevent Iran developing nuclear weapons. Tehran insists its nuclear programme is entirely peaceful. ‘ISRAEL PREPARED’ The purported leaked Israeli memo suggests that the military operation would begin with a massive cyberattack against Iran’s infrastructure, followed by a barrage of ballistic missiles launched at its nuclear facilities. Military command-and-control systems, research and development facilities, and the homes of senior figures in nuclear and missile
Iran has the largest and most diverse ballistic missile arsenal in the Middle East.
development would also be targeted. Only then would manned aircraft be sent in to attack “a short-list of those targets which require further assault”. BBC diplomatic correspondent Jonathan Marcus says it is not possible to verify the authenticity of the document, but the proposed mission would be huge and have potentially far-reaching consequences. Iran’s government and military have made it clear that if it is attacked either by Israel or the US, it will respond in kind, either directly or through proxies. In his interview with Maariv, Mr Vilnai said Israel had “prepared as never before”.
“There is no room for hysteria,” said the former general, who is stepping down at the end of August to become Israel’s ambassador to China. He echoed an assessment by Defence Minister Ehud Barak, who said that it was believed that some 500 people in Israel might be killed. “There might be fewer dead, or more, perhaps... but this is the scenario for which we are preparing, in accordance with the best expert advice.” “The assessments are for a war that will last 30 days on several fronts,” he added, alluding to the possibility of attacks by the Iranian-backed Lebanese Shia Islamist movement, Hezbollah, and Palestinian Islamist militants in the Gaza Strip.
Off-duty cop kills angry dad after hurting the man’s daughter with his motorcycle Prince Philip has spent the last few days taking part in Cowes Week on the Isle of Wight.
Prince Philip back in hospital ‘as a precaution’
THE Duke of Edinburgh has been taken to hospital as a “precautionary measure” after a recurrence of a bladder infection, Buckingham Palace has said. Prince Philip, who is 91, was driven by ambulance to Aberdeen Royal Infirmary while staying at Balmoral with the Queen, a spokesperson said. The duke originally suffered the infection shortly before the Diamond Jubilee concert on 4 June. He is likely to remain in the NHS hospital for the next few days. Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall are at their private residence of Birkhall on the Balmoral Estate, BBC correspondent Peter
Hunt says. It is not known whether other royals are there, but a palace spokesman said it was usual for members of the royal family to be in residence at Balmoral during the summer period. The duke was last seen at public engagements in Cowes earlier this week. It is the third time he has been in hospital in the last nine months: he also spent four days in hospital over Christmas, following an operation to clear a blocked heart artery. In March, Prince Harry said the operation - which was successful - had given his grandfather a “new spurt of life”.
AN OFF-duty Chicago police officer injured a 4-year-old girl with his motorcycle, and then shot and killed her outraged father. Fraternal Order of Police Spokesman Pat Camden said the cop “fired in defense of his life,” the Chicago Sun-Times reported. The 43-year-old officer, an eight-year veteran of the force, intentionally ditched his motorcycle Saturday night in Maywood when he saw the little girl – identified by WLS-TV as Taniyah Middleton – suddenly run into his path. The downed bike skidded down the street, slamming into the 4-yearold and her 18-year-old cousin John Passley, who had rushed to help her. As the officer tried to help, her 26-year-old dad, Christopher Middleton, came out of a nearby restaurant. Officials said he was visibly angry and shouting. After the officer identified himself as a cop, Middleton punched him in the face and continued to pummel him after he fell to the ground.
Christopher Middleton and his 4-year-old daughter Taniyah.
Passley allegedly joined in by kicking the officer. “He was about to lose consciousness to people beating him,” Camden said. The cop drew his gun and fired once at Middleton. He was pronounced dead at a local hospital later Saturday night, leaving behind a 6-year-old son and an unborn child as well as his daughter. “Chris was a great father,” Middleton’s cousin, Mathis Hoskin, said. “He was always helpful, never
mad - always happy with a smile on his face.” An off-duty Illinois police officer injured 4-year-old Taniyah Middleton with his motorcycle, and then shot and killed her outraged father Christopher Middleton. Taniyah spent the night in the hospital for contusions and abrasions, according to the SunTimes. The officer suffered possible broken bones from the motorcycle accident, as well as contusions from the beating.