British bank accused of helping to fund terrorists

Standard Chartered, one of the UK's largest banks, is facing allegations of facilitating transactions for funders of terrorist groups, as per US court papers. The bank managed to avoid prosecution by the US Department of Justice after intervention from Lord Cameron's government in 2012. Recent documents submitted to a New York court assert that the bank conducted thousands of transactions totaling over $100 billion from 2008 to 2013, violating sanctions against Iran. An independent expert has identified $9. 6 billion of foreign exchange transactions with individuals and companies designated by the US government as funding 'terror groups' like Hezbollah, Hamas, al-Qaeda, and the Taliban. The bank has refuted the whistleblowers' claims, stating that their previous allegations were 'thoroughly discredited' by US authorities. Standard Chartered was accused of falsifying transaction data on Swift, an international payment system, to move billions of dollars through its New York branch on behalf of sanctioned entities such as the Central Bank of Iran. However, in September 2012, George Osborne, then chancellor in Lord Cameron's government, secretly intervened on the bank's behalf, leading to the US Department of Justice's decision not to prosecute the bank.