The effort to recover Bangladesh’s stolen wealth has picked up pace in the last few days.
On 10 March 2025 Chief Adviser to the Bangladesh interim government, Muhammad Yunus, chaired an important meeting titled “Recovery of Laundered Assets, Steps Taken, and Challenges.”
The outcome of the meeting was a roadmap to recover laundered funds that are linked to 11 individuals and industries. Speed is paramount in these cases and the roadmap aims to complete at least half of the cases within the year.
Elements of the roadmap
Key elements of the roadmap include:
- A new law in Bangladesh to accelerate efforts to repatriate the money. This is expected to be finalised within a week.
- The appointment of international firms to seize assets abroad.
- Sanctions imposed on the sale or transfer of laundered assets.
- Establishing a dedicated Asset Recovery Agency to coordinate the efforts.
The UK’s response
The UK government has expressed its support for the repatriation of stolen wealth to Bangladesh (see answer to the Home office written question on 22 January 2025[1]), and the Bangladesh Bank Governor, Ashan H Mansur will hold a conference in the UK with law firms and intelligence agencies on 19 March 2025.
There is also a conference scheduled in May to unite the global assistance on tracing the stolen assets. The conference, called “Bangladesh Asset Recovery Conference”, will be organised by the Bangladesh central bank, the International Anti-Corruption Coordination Centre, and the World Bank’s Stolen Asset Recovery Initiative (StAR).
For the 11 priority cases, work will begin as soon as possible to recover the laundered funds. This involves identifying the assets and then putting them out of reach by various legal mechanisms including: freezing, attaching, seizing, and confiscating illegal assets.
It appears that these priority cases involve 342 properties in the UK, and will likely involve other assets and bank accounts.
Routes in England & Wales to recover misappropriated assets
Looking at the roadmap, it appears that criminal and civil cases will be considered to recover any assets. The criminal route will likely involve government to government discussions. In the UK, the relevant authorities involved in this process will be the National Crime Agency and there will be discussions with the UK Foreign Office and Justice Secretary.
The civil asset recovery will require the involvement of UK law firms.
In order to bring the claim in the UK against defendants who may be based in Bangladesh (or at least outside the EU or the UK), the lawyers will need to demonstrate to the UK courts that:
- The claim has a reasonable prospect of success
- The claim satisfies a jurisdictional gateway in CPR Practice Direction 6B; and
- England and Wales is the proper place to bring the claim
When UK proceedings are issued against a defendant who is outside of the jurisdiction, the lawyers will need to show that the claim falls within one of the jurisdictional gateways in CPR Practice Direction 6B. These gateways are now sufficiently broad that it is likely that permission will be granted to serve proceedings on a defendant who is outside of the jurisdiction.
There is a gateway for service out of the jurisdiction of Norwich Pharmacal Orders and Bankers Trust Orders, which helps parties identify the identity of a defendant, or what has become of the claimant’s property.
Establishing that the UK is the proper place to bring the claim may be challenging if the defendants are located abroad. The Court will consider the availability of witnesses and where the parties reside. However, given that property has allegedly been bought with misappropriated funds in the UK, it is likely that we will be able to establish a sufficient link to the UK to bring the claim.
A dynamic approach is required
These types of claims in civil asset recovery require dynamic thinking innovative solutions, which are more suited to specialist, agile law firms. Larger law firms tend to be risk averse and slowed down by red tape, particularly in cases related to Politically Exposed Persons.
In contrast, specialist firms on the other hand operate with greater speed and have faster processes; flexible fee structures; and tend to be more cost effective for these cases of civil asset recovery.
With the aim of completing at least half of these cases within the year, having a team that can move decisively and adapt quickly will be a key advantage.
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