Category Archives: Journalism
FBME Cyprus: the global criminal’s bank of choice
S&P Global Market Intelligence, the financial newswire where I work as a reporter, recently published my investigative series into FBME, the now cosed rogue Cypriot bank linked to the Russian mafia, Syrian war crimes, fraud, money laundering, corrupt offshore finance … Continue reading
Posted in Journalism
Tagged chemical weapons, cyprus, eastern ghouta attack, fadi saab, farid saab, fbme, fraud, hermitage capital, khan shaikhoun, michael saab, michel saab, money laundering, organised crime, rogue bank, russia, saab brothers, sarin gas, sergey magnitsky, ssrc, syria, war crimes
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The Wapping Mole discovers likely Romanian prostitution ring
The Wapping Mole, a lively blog running journalistic investigations and general interest news about the Wapping neighbourhood of Tower Hamlets, London, has discovered what appears to be a Romanian sex trafficking gang operating on the quaint cobblestoned streets it patrols. … Continue reading
Posted in Journalism
Tagged human trafficking, london, love wapping, modern slavery, romanian gangs, sex trafficking, tower hamlets, wapping, wapping mole
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Moldova’s other choice
Maia Sandu could be living proof that Moldovans don’t necessarily have to choose between handing their lives over to either oligarchs or communists. Much has changed for the better in Moldova in recent months — there is a new governor … Continue reading
Another Brick Lane Tale
Much ink has been used on the topic of how the East End is now compared to the good ol’ days. Of all the well-documented waves of immigrants that came here, Eastern Europeans like me are the newest. I was … Continue reading
Posted in Journalism, Prose
Tagged brick lane, east end, east london, gentrification, roman road, spitalfields, stepney, whitechapel
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The ‘silent secret’ app
Before spending eight months as a night-shift delivery driver for a posh deli called Benugo, I distributed flyers advertising the Silent Secret app to children in Barking, East London, for a few hours in December 2014 as a means to … Continue reading
Posted in Journalism, Prose
Tagged apps for children, electronic privacy, silent secret, silent secret app
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Gentles’ Easter
-all pictures mine (full copy rights etc) Celebrated the week after Easter, Gentles’ Easter is widely considered the most important holiday of the year by many Moldovans. This year it fell on the 19th and 20th of April, when cemeteries … Continue reading
Posted in Journalism
Tagged gentles easter, grant thornton, missing billion, moldova, pastele blajinilor
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I used #BBCAskThis…
… to bring up issues I think have been as yet overlooked in the campaign leading up to the UK general elections. I have no idea whether the questions will be considered – I made them out in writing and … Continue reading
Profiling Guccifer
Some more material and a few shreds of thought on the story and the hacker himself… The other day Pando.com of San Francisco published my big feature on the Romanian hacker Guccifer, real name Marcel Lazar-Lehel. He is a fascinating … Continue reading
Posted in Journalism, Prose
Tagged guccifer, guccifer archive, hillary clinton, marcel lazar lehel, micul fum, pando, romanian hacker
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No Land’s Man or How Not to Do an Election
The 2014 presidential elections were a pyrrhic victory for Western values in post-Communist Romania. Note: a Romanian language version of this article was published by Gazeta de Romania, a London-based newspaper for Romanian expats. Read it here. Thousands of Romanians … Continue reading
The Medianett saga: adventures in mercenary churnalism
“Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme…” – John Milton, Paradise Lost, 1667 Cub reporters: beware of marketing agencies employing investigative journalists. These wrongens* will likely try to corrupt you. Initially I wanted to be the source instead of the … Continue reading
Posted in Journalism, Prose
Tagged alternative finance, bridging and commercial, bridging loans, british finance, caron schreuder, chanice henry, fca, financial conduct authority, journalism 101, libel, loans industry, lynda blackwell, media corruption, medianett, medianett limited, medianett ltd, mo mulki, sainsbury's knickers, secured loans, secured loans industry, short term loans, wrongens
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