UK Crime Agency Uncovers Money Laundering Network That Bought Kyrgyzstan Bank to Move Ransom Payments to Russia

The UK’s National Crime Agency (NCA) has revealed that a billion-dollar money laundering network operating in Britain purchased a majority stake in a bank in Kyrgyzstan to process the proceeds of cybercrime and convert them into cryptocurrency that could evade Western sanctions and support Russia’s war in Ukraine. 

The development emerged as part of Operation Destabilise, an international investigation targeting two major Russian-run money laundering groups known as TGR and Smart. The networks allegedly handled ransom proceeds for some of the world’s most aggressive cybercrime groups, including Evil Corp, Conti, Ryuk and LockBit.
According to the NCA, cash-to-crypto swaps have become a crucial layer of the global criminal ecosystem, allowing ransom funds to be converted into digital currency and transferred across borders with minimal oversight. 

The NCA said that a company tied to alleged TGR ringleader George Rossi, called Altair Holding SA, acquired a 75 percent stake in Keremet Bank in Kyrgyzstan on 25 December 2024. Investigators later concluded that Keremet had conducted extensive cross-border transactions on behalf of Russia’s state-owned Promsvyazbank, an institution sanctioned by the US and UK after the invasion of Ukraine and previously linked to political interference in Moldova. 

The Kyrgyzstan connection came after UK authorities sanctioned Altair Holding in

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