S. Sudan: Britain sanctions Sudanese businessman over corruption links with government

JUBA — British government on Monday imposed sanctions against a Sudanese businessman tycoon over established corruption links with the government of war-ravaged South Sudan.

Ashraf Seed Ahmed Hussein Ali, also known as Al Cardinal, was blacklisted for alleged involvement in misappropriation of state property in South Sudan.

He is among 22 people sanctioned by the United Kingdom for alleged involved in corruption cases in Russia, South Africa, South Sudan and elsewhere.

The new global anticorruption sanctions regime, which follows the establishment of the country’s global human-rights sanctions regime in July, gives the U.K. a powerful device to deter serious corruption around the world, British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said Monday.

“Britain is standing up for democracy, good governance and the rule of law,” British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said Monday.

“We are saying to those involved in serious corruption: We will not tolerate you or your dirty money in our country,” Raab added.

Under its human-rights sanctions regime, the U.K. has sanctioned 78 individuals and entities from places such as Myanmar, Belarus, China and Russia, according to the U.K.’s Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office.

The 22 individuals added to U.K.’s sanctions list Monday face travel bans and asset freezes under the sanctions system put in place as part of Britain’s exit from the European Union. Previously, the U.K. followed European Union and United Nations sanctions regimes.

Among those designated Monday are individuals allegedly involved in the diversion of $230 million of Russian state property through a fraudulent tax refund scheme uncovered by Sergei Magnitsky, a Russian lawyer who died in a Moscow prison in 2009 after accusing government officials of corruption.