Kleptocracy Weekly: July 5- July 7

The week’s leading news and features about kleptocracy and its enablers

HSBC escapes US charges after UK jitters, senior Treasury official calls for end to shell company secrecy, and Europe rounds up Russian money laundering gangs

A tour spotlights kleptocracy in London, congressional bills seek to combat shell companies, and Hong Kong insurance policies susceptible to money laundering

A Central Asian leader owns a London mansion via murky offshore structures, a Russian oligarch claims extradition efforts are a political ploy, and China’s most wanted corrupt cadre complains she won’t receive a fair trial in Beijing

Russian space agency committed $1.8 billion worth of financial violations, China issues a white paper on military strategy, and 100 billion pounds worth of real estate in England and Wales is owned by shell companies

One billion dollars goes missing from Moldova, China’s corrupt officials are on the lam in New Zealand, and Ukrainians wonder who is behind a string of high-profile political murders

China welcomes the U.S. to visit its man-made islands in disputed waters, Austria refuses to extradite a Ukrainian oligarch suspected of corruption, and money continues to pour from Russia into offshore havens

The Swiss make a move to help Ukraine return Yanukovych’s illicit assets, Chinese prosecutors chase corrupt officials around Australia, and a Kazakh city sues in U.S. courts to claw back $300m stolen by a former mayor

A Texas oil firm pays nearly a quarter of a billion dollars in fines for sanctions violations, an analyst profiles the leader of China’s anti-corruption drive, and Putin urges the FSB to turn up the heat on “foreign agents” and local sympathizers