The IRA's money laundering empire is so vast that they have been negotiating to buy a bank in Bulgaria, it was reported yesterday. The Provisionals have been working with a Bulgarian crime syndicate for the last year, trying to take control of a bank to be used to launder cash from their criminal operations, security sources said. The banking operation would have lasted until 2007, when Bulgaria joins the EU, and would then become subject to stringent financial controls, the Irish Times reported.Noel Conroy, the Garda commissioner, confirmed that his detectives had been working abroad. "It's a bit too early to go into details, but we will be following up in relation to matters overseas," he said. The IRA's "colossal" money laundering business has unravelled after Irish security services spotted a Bulgarian arms dealer at a meeting in Ireland. Yesterday, as detectives continued to follow his trail, a further £437,000 in cash was taken by Garda officers from several premises, bringing to almost £3 million the amount recovered from the £26 million Northern Bank robbery in Belfast in December. Police believe the Bulgarian bank would have been used to launder the estimated £30 million a year the IRA receives from counterfeiting, robberies, extortion, racketeering and smuggling.
Using a scam the Italian mafia devised of buying banks in Latvia before it joined the EU last year, the IRA would have used the bank to provide it with paperwork and cash from a legitimate institution. Mr Conroy said forensic tests were expected to confirm that the money seized in the Republic was connected to the Northern Bank robbery. Standing next to Mr Conroy at a press conference in Hillsborough Castle, Hugh Orde, the Police Service of Northern Ireland's chief constable, announced a new protocol that would cement a new level of co-operation between the two forces. Officers from both sides of the border would work in each other's services.