US offers $5m reward for crime gang linked to Scottish criminals
US authorities are offering a $5 million (£3.8m) reward for information on the Irish Kinahan crime gang – allegedly linked to Edinburgh’s drugs scene – that leads to the arrest and conviction of its leaders.
The crime clan includes Daniel Kinahan, a well-known figure in boxing circles as a cofounder of the MTK Global agency, which represents a number of boxing's top fighters,includingscotland’sunified light-welterwightworldchampion Josh Taylor.
Mr Kinahan says he cut ties with the company in 2017 but was photographed recently in Dubai with Tyson Fury.
Taylor is represented by MTK Global and once described Mr Kinahan as a "great adviser" who is doing great things for the sport of boxing.
It comes as a US government departmentimposedsanctions against seven senior members of the Kinahan crime gang as
partofabidtotargettheirfinancial operations.
A major unprecedented joint action by American, Irish and British authorities have targeted the international cartel as partofitseffortstodismantleit.
US ambassador to Ireland Claire Cronin said the American authorities were offering the $5m reward for information that will lead to the "financialdestruction"ofthekinahan gang or the arrest and conviction of its leaders, Christy Kinahan Snr and/or his sons Daniel and Christopher Jnr.
Also named and sanctioned by the US department of the treasury'sofficeofforeignassets control (OFAC) were Kinahan associates Sean Mcgovern, Ian Dixon, Bernard Clancy and John Morrissey.
A number of businesses were alsoidentifiedasbeingassociated with the Kinahan operation.
The US treasury office said that the Kinahan crime gang is established in Ireland, the UK, Spain, and the United Arab Emirates.
Describing their operations as a "significant transnational criminal organisation", it said the gang emerged in the late 1990s and early 2000s as the most "powerful organised crime group" operating in Ireland.
Since then, Irish courts have said that the Kinahan gang is a "murderous organisation" involved in the international trafficking of drugs and firearms.
The Kinahans also frequently use Dubai as a facilitation hub for its "illicit activities".