Ed Siddons

4 weeks ago | thebureauinvestigates.com | Ed Siddons |David Pegg

Queen Elizabeth’s private solicitor spent eight years helping to manage the offshore wealth of an alleged war criminal, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ) and the Guardian can reveal. Rifaat al-Assad, uncle of former Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad, is known as the “butcher of Hama” due to longstanding allegations that he played a key role in the 1982 massacre of tens of thousands of Syrians. In 2024, Switzerland formally charged him with war crimes.

Dec 16, 2024 | thebureauinvestigates.com | Ed Siddons

The collapse of the Assad regime in Syria has sent shockwaves around the world and marks the end of a dictatorship that has left the state in tatters. As well as brutal repression during the country’s decade-long civil war, the charges against the Assad family include systematic corruption on a staggering scale. Members of the family have allegedly looted hundreds of millions of pounds from the Syrian people.

Dec 16, 2024 | theguardian.com | David Pegg |Ed Siddons |Rob Byrne |Meriem Mahdhi

An uncle of the recently ousted Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad used an adviser in Guernsey to secretly manage his wealth, which includeda vast European property empire worth hundreds of millions of euros that prosecutors claim wasacquired with funds looted from the wartorn state. Rifaat al-Assad, known as the “Butcher of Hama” for overseeing the violent suppression of a rebellion in the 1980s, has been accused of war crimes by Swiss prosecutors.

Nov 22, 2024 | thebureauinvestigates.com | Ed Siddons

A sexual abuser; a wealthy businessman; a landlord “offering substandard and potentially dangerous accommodation to vulnerable people”; a “wealth creator”. All of them silenced scrutiny by using the threat of a lawsuit against their critics, a cross-party group of MPs argued in Parliament on Thursday. The debate was prompted by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism’s (TBIJ) Silenced Stories project.

Aug 16, 2024 | thebureauinvestigates.com | Ed Siddons

The UK’s largest law firm sought £1.1m in legal fees from climate campaigners to cover the costs of preventing their protests, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism can reveal. DLA Piper, a multibillion-pound law firm, tried to recoup eye-watering costs, including fees of £350 per hour for providing legal advice to its clients HS2 and National Highways Limited (NHL) – both publicly owned bodies.