Breaking News: In a shocking move Nigeria authorities detain two executives of the popular cryptocurrency exchange platform Binance, 9AM News Nigeria can authoritatively report.
This unforeseen action by the Nigeria authorities is coming on the heels of the country’s all out war against the rapidly expanding cryptocurrency markets in Nigeria.
Tigran Gambaryan and Nadeem Anjarwalla the two Binance executives detained by the Nigerian authorities flew into the country for discussions with government agents but ended up being detained on the 26 of February 2024.
9AM news Nigeria obtained a comment from an insider who said “The two men are being held simply as hostages but they are being treated well”. The Nigerian government is demanding for Binance to turnover information about the top 100 users of ite cryptocurrency platform in the country and their transaction history for the past six months.
A special adviser to Nigeria’s president Bola Tinubu said the country may also demand a payment of $10bn from Binance as a “retribution”. Financial Times reporter revealed that they had previously seen documents sent from Nigeria’s National Security Adviser, Mr. Nuhu Ribadu requesting Binance to resolve all outstanding tax liabilities.
According to information bits obtained by Ogasabi, the Nigerian government invited both men to come and discuss the recent cryptocurrency ban by Nigeria. They landed in Abuja, Nigeria’s capital on 25 February and met the Nigerian officials the following day. But after two hours of initial discussions the authorities saw both men off to their hotel and then in an unexpected move they seized their passports and phones and eventually detained them in a guesthouse on the direct orders of Nigeria’s National Security Adviser.
One former prosecutor who had worked with one of the detained Binance executives, Tigran Gambaryan described him as a man of sound character and of the highest integrity.
However on March 25, in a strange twist of events still largely unexplainable Ogasabi have fetched news that the two Binance executives made an escape from detention and fled Nigeria just days before the country was supposed to announce tax evasion charges against them.
Binance on 13 March published information detailing its extensive and willful cooperation with the Nigerian authorities.
On the global stage Binance has been striving to repair relations with authorities in other countries. It paid the sum of $4.3b to US authories last November in criminal fines and forfeitures. Its founder and former CEO Founder and former Chief Executive Changpeng Zhao quit the firm and pled guilty to money laundering in the USA.
US Attorney General Merrick Garland said Zhao had: “willfully violated federal law that guards against money laundering and terrorist financing”.
He added: “From the very beginning, Zhao and other Binance executives had engaged in a deliberate and calculated effort to profit from the US market without implementing the controls that are required by US law,” Garland said. The US attorney general identified millions in transactions from the US to Iranian users, users in Syria and Russian-occupied Ukraine, and terrorist groups including Isis.
