(File/AFP)
PM:03:27:28/07/2021
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SULAIMANI — Leaving a
trail of misery in his wake, a man accused of helping to organize a
multi-million dollar cryptocurrency fraud in the Kurdistan Region and Iraq has
fled abroad, sources told NRT.
Touting himself as the
Asia Director for Praetorian Group International (PGI), Bako Faisal allegedly
organized a fraudulent scheme from an office in Erbil that solicited money from
people in the Kurdistan Region, promising to invest in cryptocurrency
transactions that would yield large returns.
According to multiple
sources, Faisal and his associates may have defrauded more than 3,000 people in
Iraq of upwards of $40 million.
"Only the leaders and
insiders will know the real figures," Abdurrahman Bapir, an entrepreneur and
founder of cryptocurrency brokerage and analysis service Kurdcoin, told NRT.
One of the victims of
the PGI scheme, who NRT is not naming at their request, said that he gave
Faisal $37,000 to invest in cryptocurrency with the promise that his investment
would double in just six months.
"But the company did
not return any money to us for four months," the investor said.
At that point, Faisal
fled the Kurdistan Region, reportedly to the UK.
Some of his victims
have begun organizing a legal complaint against Faisal and an associate named
Dustan Kamaran that they plan to file in a court in Erbil, but police have not
yet said whether they have launched an investigation.
Fraud schemes are
common in the Kurdistan Region, which lacks a modern banking system and no
effective consumer protection regime. Moreover, financial literacy remains low
for many members of the public, who are used to simple cash transactions.
Bapir said that the
dangers associated with the PGI scheme were "so obvious."
"I am baffled people
would buy into it…[but] we often underestimate the leaders and people in charge
of these schemes in their ability to recruit and incentivize others," he added.
Last winter, accused
fraudster Suleiman Halshoy was arrested on charges of defrauding more than
1,000 people of tens of millions of dollars in the Raparin administration using
a Ponzi scheme. He remains in custody pending trial.
One method that
Halshoy used to convince his victims that he could bring a sizable return on
their investments was to claim that he was using cryptocurrency, though there
is no evidence that he was doing so.
Bapir told NRT that
part of Kurdcoin’s activities is to spread awareness about fraud, regularly
posting messages on social media with information about how people can protect
themselves.
Warning people in the
Kurdistan Region against investing in investments that seem too good to be
true, Kurdcoin said in one post that "only those who are above the pyramid will
benefit from it, but most people will lose their money."
It is not clear
whether Faisal will face any legal consequences for the alleged fraud since he
is no longer in the Kurdistan Region.
PGI’s website has
since shuttered and its employees were unreachable for comment.
As a result, others
are left to face the consequences, with the investor who spoke to NRT saying
that the victims are experiencing "social problems."
"Many citizens have
been harmed because of the company," they said.
(NRT Digital Media)