Barclays bribed Saudi royalty: lawsuit

Barclays bribed a member of the Saudi royal family and ignored a defaulted lease payment from the country in order to secure a rare banking license inside Saudi Arabia, a lawsuit against the bank alleges.

The giant UK bank should have gone after the lease payment but chose not to because it didn’t want to anger the government and risk losing the lucrative business, according to the lawsuit, filed by a Saudi real estate company in Manhattan state court.

“Barclays knew that any such license would be extremely lucrative and that its litigations against the Saudi government made obtaining such a license impossible,” according to the suit.

The real estate company, Jadawel International, also claims Barclays paid millions in a “thinly disguised bribe” to a company owned by a Saudi prince for advisory services.

Barclays strongly denied the accusations.

“This claim follows a failed attempt by the plaintiffs to obtain discovery of documents earlier this year, which the [New York Supreme Court] denied as it was an unmeritorious fishing expedition,” Mark Lane, a Barclays spokesman, said in an email.