Foreign Affairs

Panama Papers Law Firm Named Spy Accounts After Bond Movies

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The law firm at the center of the global tax evasion “Panama Papers” scandal named the accounts of spies as well as spy-enthusiast clients after Bond movies and villains.

According to the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists – ICIJ – Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca, “incorporated companies named Goldfinger, SkyFall, GoldenEye, Moonraker, Spectre and Blofeld.” The firm was also asked to set up a firm named Octopussy.

Mossack Fonseca had many prominent and secretive clients including intelligence officers and their pals. Among the cloak and dagger accounts managed by the firm were those of the former intelligence chiefs of Peru — Cesar Almeyda — and Rwanda — Emmanuel Ndahiro. The first ever chief of Saudi Arabian intelligence and the CIA’s Middle East point man Sheikh Kamal Adham – who died in 1999 – also used the services of the firm.

Another prominent friend of spooks using the law firm to hide his cash is longtime Clinton donor Farhad Azima who was long associated with the Iran-Contra affair. The New York Times reported that one of his airplanes was used to deliver weapons to the Nicaraguan Contras – which he denies.

Another prominent client of the controversial law firm is Loftur Johannesson who worked for the CIA in the 1970s and 1980s which let him buy a French vineyard and Caribbean home in Barbados. Johannesson was a gun runner for the CIA, providing the Afghan Mujahadeen with weaponry to defeat the Communist Soviets that had taken the country.

Johannesson is not the only CIA gun runner with ties to Mossack Fonseca. Saudi 1980s billionaire businessman Adnan Khashoggi who sent weapons to Iran in the 1990s was also a client of the firm. Legendary German spy Werner Mauss – also known as Claus Möllner or Agent 008 – was also a client of the firm.

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