Bank of England Governor Mark Carney is coming under fresh fire over an imminent meeting with two of Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro’s key sidekicks. Extraordinarily, Guido understands that Carney is due to meet a delegation from Maduro’s ruinous regime tomorrow including Calixto Ortega Sanchez, the self-styled “President” of the Venezuelan Central Bank, and Simon Zerpa, Maduro’s Finance Minister. The delegation want Carney to transfer them $550 million of gold held by the Bank of England. Nothing suspicious about that at all…

Ortega Sanchez was appointed by Maduro but never ratified by the Venezuelan National Assembly, who have accused him of “usurping” their authority. Zerpa was sanctioned by the US Government for stealing hundreds of million of dollars and is heavily involved in the many corruption schemes of the Venezuelan regime, including the FONDEN slush fund. Neither have the credentials for the roles they’ve been granted. Carney should not even be dignifying Maduro’s cronies with a meeting, let alone seriously be considering handing over $550m of gold to them.

Tory MP Andrew Lewer, who is Vice-Chairman of the Venezuela APPG, has written urgently to Carney and Philip Hammond, describing the meeting as “entirely inappropriate” and urging Carney not to “confer respectability on a regime placeman such as Calixto Ortega who is unlawfully seeking to present himself as a central bank president.” Lewer also warns that “any transfer of gold to the regime would be quite wrong, as the proceeds would either be used for corrupt personal enrichment of regime leaders, or intensified repression of the population, or both.” Carney has already tarnished the Bank’s reputation with his politicking on Brexit, this would take it to new depths…

Read Lewer’s letter in full here:

UPDATE: Interestingly, if Carney did hand over the cash it wouldn’t be the first time the Bank of England has handed over gold to a murderous regime in dubious circumstances…