Swiss bankers swear

Swiss bankers swear they are trying to help Africa get its dirty money back

It irritates Valentin Zellweger that ‘no longer than six minutes into any James Bond movie, a sleazy Swiss banker still appears.’

He’s probably referring especially to Mr Lachaise, the nasty Swiss banker and financier of terrorists and crooks in The World is Not Enough. At one point Lachaise says to Bond, ‘I’m just trying to return the money to its rightful owner’. To which Bond replies: ‘And we know how hard that is for a Swiss banker’.

Such stock characters (like Mendel from Casino Royale), only serve to reinforce the stereotype of Switzerland as a safe haven for stolen money and other ill-gotten gains, Zellweger complains.

That stereotype is now something of an anachronism, insists Zellweger, director general of public international law and legal Advisor of the Swiss foreign ministry. He says his country is now indeed at the forefront of international efforts to recover and return such loot, and to cast light into its bank vaults.
http://qz.com/705509/swiss-bankers-swear-they-are-trying-to-help-africa-get-its-dirty-money-back/
The Real Style ------ NP 2016