CEO says Nigeria has set dangerous precedent by detaining Binance executives

The CEO of cryptocurrency exchange Binance on Tuesday accused Nigeria of setting a dangerous precedent after its executives were invited to the African country and then detained as part of a crackdown on crypto.

The world’s largest crypto exchange Binance and two of its executives are facing separate lawsuits over tax evasion and money laundering, which the company is challenging.

CEO Richard Teng said in a statement that now is the time to speak out against the detention of Tigran Gambarian, a US citizen and Binance’s head of financial crime compliance.

The other executive, Nadeem Anjarwala, a British-Kenyan who is regional manager for Africa, fled Nigeria in March.

Teng said Binance executives first met with Nigerian officials in the country in January.

In a follow-up meeting on February 26, officials said the issues involving Binance were national security and demanded that the exchange remove the Naira currency from its platform and provide “granular-level” details on all Nigerian users, they said. Said.

Gambarian and Anjarwala were later detained.

“Inviting a company’s mid-level employees to collaborative policy meetings, and then simply detaining them, is a major threat to all companies around the world,” Teng said in his harshest comments since the case began in February. A dangerous new precedent has been set for

Gambarian was being held in Nigeria for more than two months “for spurious reasons”, Teng said.

Binance announced in early March that it was ceasing all transactions and trading in Naira.

“When we took this drastic step our hope was that our associates would be released and Binance would be able to continue working with the Nigerian government to resolve further concerns. Unfortunately, this did not happen,” Tan said. .

He said the Gambians should be allowed to go home while Binance and Nigerian authorities will resolve any issues.

“We will continue to engage with the Federal Inland Revenue Service of Nigeria (FIRS) to resolve potential historical tax liabilities,” he said.

© Thomson Reuters 2024