The police have declined to comment on claims a Pilatus Bank suspect was allowed to leave the country despite facing an arrest warrant.

Rule of law NGO Repubblika recently alleged that the bank’s operations supervisor Mehmet Tasli was allowed to freely enter and leave Malta despite the arrest warrant.

Contacted about the claims, a police spokesperson said the Police Act prevents them from divulging details of ongoing investigations.

An affidavit presented to court last month by former PN MP Jason Azzopardi detailed how Tasli had even walked in and out of the court building last year unchallenged.

According to the account, Tasli was summoned as a witness in October 2021 to testify about a request by the bank for a partial lifting of its freezing order, to be allowed to carry out certain payments. 

Repubblika president Robert Aquilina said during a July press conference outside the law courts that two attorney general lawyers were present on the day Tasli testified.

“They questioned him, then allowed him to walk out of the court building. He was allowed to leave Malta unchallenged,” Aquilina said.

A month earlier, both the bank and one of its former officials had been charged with money laundering.

Court action had also been ordered, by a magisterial inquiry into the bank’s dealings, against other top officials including Tasli and former bank owner Ali Sadr, but the police have yet to charge them.

Pilatus Bank was fined a record €4.9 million by Malta’s anti-money laundering unit last month for a “serious and systemic failure” to follow anti-money laundering laws.

The account holders whose money bank officials were allegedly laundering have also yet to face prosecution.

The investigation into Pilatus Bank’s operations came across scores of potentially suspicious transactions and corporate structures operated by the bank’s clients, including the daughters of Azerbaijan’s president, Ilham Aliyev.

Using an array of complex corporate vehicles, Ilham Aliyev’s two daughters alone parked over €120 million in loans and deposits at the Ta’ Xbiex-based bank.

Around 25 per cent of the funds held by various customers at the bank flowed in from the United Arab Emirates, including payments to Azeri-controlled accounts.

Other significant financial flows into the bank were detected from Turkey, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan.