A. R. (Abdul Raouf) Khalil

A. R. (Abdul Raouf) Khalil is a high-level officer in Saudi Arabian intelligence and a key BCCI front man.¹ He was a prominent figure in Agha Hasan Abedi's network of wealthy Middle Eastern individuals who were shareholders in BCCI and its associated entities.

Role in BCCI Operations

Khalil was one of the nominees used by Abedi to secretly purchase shares in CCAH, the holding company that owned First American Bank.² He was also a recipient of large, fictitious loans from BCCI, such as $168 million, which were used to create the illusion of capital within the bank.³

His involvement in BCCI's operations highlights the bank's strategy of using influential figures to conceal its true ownership and illicit financial activities. Khalil, along with Kamal Adham and Ghaith R. Pharaon, held significant shares in BCCI and its subsidiaries, often acquired through these fraudulent loans.⁴

The Federal Reserve and the CIA

The Kerry-Brown Senate Report described Khalil as, like Kamal Adham, "a BCCI shareholder and front man from its creation, and a key nominee in BCCI's secret takeover of First American." He appeared before the Federal Reserve on April 23, 1981, and presented himself as a private businessman: "My career has been devoted to business and I presently hold interests in real estate, mechanical and electrical maintenance projects, and commodities. In addition, I have been involved in some business ventures with American and British manufacturers for the installation of electronic and computer equipment in Saudi Arabia." The report found that he did not tell the Federal Reserve that he was then a key figure in Saudi intelligence and its liaison to the United States, or disclose that one of his businesses was the Saudi Security and Technical Services Company, which supplied electronic and computer equipment to the Saudi government and its intelligence operations.⁵ The CIA told the Federal Reserve it had no derogatory information on the shareholders, among them Adham and Khalil, "the past and then-current Saudi intelligence liaisons to the United States."⁵ The Federal Reserve found in 1991 that Khalil, Adham, Faisal Saud al-Fulaij and the other Middle Eastern nominees "had secretly done precisely what the Federal Reserve had sought to assure they would not do."⁶

According to Price Waterhouse audit reports, Khalil had no written contact with BCCI from 1985; by the late 1980s senior BCCI officials knew of no way to reach him, and the chief financial officer, Masihur Rahman, doubted he existed. BCCI nevertheless used his name extensively as a nominee in Latin America, the Caribbean and Europe, and he was a principal shareholder and director of BCCI's commodities affiliate, Capcom. When American regulators asked the State Department in 1991 to locate him for service of legal papers, they were told he could not be found; after some months they determined that he was frequently to be found in the offices of the CIA station chief in Saudi Arabia, and on their suggesting this, service was quickly arranged.⁵