Charity’s business with a convicted Latvian tycoon

PRINCE CHARLES’S charitable foundation went into business with a Latvian tycoon later convicted of money laundering.

Valeri Belokon, a former coowner of Blackpool Football Club, announced to fanfare in Latvia in 2010 that he and Charles had formed a joint venture, called PF Urban, to provide consultancy services in ‘ecological construction’ and ‘urban planning’.

Belokon’s company Latvijas a/s Hercogiste – which translates as The Duchy of Latvia – established PF Urban in a ‘joint venture’ with The Prince’s Foundation and a Kuwaiti property conglomerate.

Under the terms of the deal, PF Urban ran some of the foundation’s projects in countries including Latvia, Georgia and China – with Mr Belokon and a Kuwaiti investor called Sheikha Fadia AlSalem al Sabah receiving ten per cent of any profits.

According to records at Companies House, Mr Belokon, 61, was a director of PF Urban from September 2010 until June 2013 – two years after criminal proceedings began against him in Latvia over money-laundering allegations.

The case ended with his Manas Bank being taken over by the Asian republic of Kyrgyzstan.

The father-of-three, once an associate of Donald Trump, has

consistently denied any wrongdoing but a Paris court of appeal judgment in 2017 stated he had bought his bank ‘in order to develop... money-laundering practices’. Mr Belokon insists his conviction and 20-year jail term – which he faces if he returns to Latvia – were politically motivated and built on ‘fabricated evidence’.

He was, however, suspended from the board of Blackpool FC after the English Football League deemed that he was ‘not a fit and proper person’.

Describing Prince Charles in an interview in 2010, Mr Belokon said: ‘The Prince is a very educated man with his own views and a great understanding of what to do for development, a bit of a fanatical supporter of the green movement, an avid polo player and a very pleasant interlocutor.’