'My target is those who have looted my banks' – Bangladesh's governor

Despite attempts to discredit him, Dhaka’s central bank chief is determined to trace assets with the UK’s help, he tells the Observer

- Rob Davies

Imitative and softly spoken, Dr Ahsan Mansur does not project the image of a man able to strike fear into the hearts of hardened kleptocrats. Yet Bangladesh’s central bank governor has rattled someone powerful, if the events of recent days are anything to go by.

Mansur, 74, has been in London this month, meeting Foreign Office minister Catherine West, NGOs, lawyers and experts in tracing assets. They have promised to help him track down tens of billions of dollars in funds allegedly stolen from the south Asian country’s banking system under the regime of Sheikh Hasina, the autocrat deposed in last year’s student-led revolution.

In advance of his visit, several MPs were sent emails attempting to discredit Mansur. It is not clear who is behind the campaign, which one MP termed “disinformation”. But Mansur is in little doubt. “The asset recovery effort … is to go after those people who have diverted massive amounts of resources from Bangladesh and, in particular, from the banking system,” he told the Observer.

“We know the names, we all know the names, and they or their operators are putting it together [the alleged disinformation campaign].

“The sole purpose is to diminish my reputation and show that whatever he says is not what he is.”

The emails linked to articles written by “journalists” whose names turned out to be fake and whose pictures the Observer found to be stock images, they focused particularly on the expensive clothing and apparent financial comfort of Mansur’s daughter, Mehreen.

If Mansur was investigating the unexplained wealth of Bangladeshis, they suggested, why was his own family excluded? “She is an American citizen, she has little to do with Bangladesh,” he said.