“It’s probably one of series of coded signals Sinn Fein are sending in advance of the transfer of powers,” said one source. THE IRA could be preparing to start handing over weapons and explosives next month, Unionists said last night. Angered by the Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams’s prediction that all sides could be moving towards Irish unity within the next 15 years, Unionists believe the Provisionals are considering some sort of decommissioning gesture.
Unionist sources said Mr Adams’s unification claim could be seen as a deliberate sign to unnerve Unionists and calm heightening tensions among dissident republicans opposed to the peace process. Mr Dubinin has challenged the figure of $50bn, saying the largest amount managed by the firm at any one time was $1.4bn, in 1994.The last hard currency reserves were removed two years ago, he said.He said that Fimaco provided a means of sheltering Russian assets from its circling foreign creditors. It was, he said, “a necessary measure to defend the economic safety of the nation”.Neither Mr Sinel nor Mr Clyde-Smith was available for comment yesterday..

Nor has there been any clear explanation from Russian officialdom as to what happened to the money after it had passed through Financial Management Company Ltd (Fimaco).In an open letter to President Boris Yeltsin, Sergei Dubinin, former head of Russia’s Central Bank, and his deputy, Sergei Aleksashenko, confirmed that cash reserves were transferred to Fimaco between 1993 and 1997.Boris Fyodorov, a former finance minister who claims to have complained about the use of the funds in 1993 only to get the brush-off from top government officials, has offered his view that commissions – which he estimates at “tens of millions of dollars” – were pocketed by cronies of the Russian government.Scandals regularly fly around Moscow, but this one has wider dimensions, not least because it raises questions about Moscow’s relationship with the International Monetary Fund, which has lent Russia billions of dollars since the collapse of the Soviet Union.There is no suggestion of any illegality by Fimaco, which was set up in November 1990 by the St Helier law firm, Ogier and Le Masurier, “to undertake the business of a financial institution or bank other than the acceptance of deposits” – a wide-ranging brief allowing it to undertake virtually every type of financial activity.Inquiries on the island have confirmed that it was set up on behalf of the Paris-based bank, Banque Commerciale pour l’Europe du Nord (Eurobank), which is controlled by Russia’s Central Bank.The partners listed as founder members, or shareholders, were Michael Birt, now Jersey’s attorney general, Julian Clyde-Smith, still with the firm but also now a commissioner with the Financial Services Commission, and Malcolm Sinel, who recently retired as Ogier’s senior partner.Mr Birt, who relinquished all directorships and shareholdings when he was made the attorney general in 1994, said that he has no recollection of Fimaco and that it was standard practice at the time the company was formed for three of Ogier’s partners to be the founder members.”Fimaco means nothing to me, and I don’t recall the firm having many Russian clients in those days – certainly I didn’t have any,” he said.Exactly how much money went through Fimaco is disputed. FINANCIAL INVESTIGATORS in Jersey opened an inquiry yesterday into an obscure finance firm on the island that was used by Russian bankers to shield up to $50bn of state reserves from foreign creditors. Jersey’s Financial Services Commission is looking into the affairs of Fimaco, a St Helier-based company set up nine years ago by the island’s current attorney general and one of its financial regulators.
It is not illegal or even uncommon for governments to dispatch hard currency reserves overseas for investment, but the decision to use an unheard-of start-up company is considered exceptional. The red carpet appeared to be rolled out for him this week when he made a regal visit to Labour Party HQ at Millbank Tower with the party general secretary, Margaret McDonough Is he about to return to the dark shadows once again?. Constituents in Montgomeryshire thought the picture they were shown of the computer entrepreneur Bill Gates was Mr Opik while Southgate voters, when asked to identify Stephen Twigg, pointed to the photo of Michael Portillo.THE APPARENT snub by the African National Congress after this newspaper’s revelations that Peter Mandelson was expecting to provide advice on election strategy in South Africa means it is back to the drawing board on how to fill his time.

Maybe they still have work to do on their constituency profiles. Some Maidenhead electors, shown a selection of famous faces, thought Patricia Routledge was their MP. For weekend fun call www.paulflynn.co.uk. Check to see whether Mr Campbell is a turkey and why.THERESA MAY (C, Maidenhead), Lembit Opik (LD, Montgomeryshire) and Stephen Twigg (Lab, Enfield Southgate) were nominated at the House Magazine/ Channel 4 ceremony for the Rising Star award but were beaten by Oona King (Lab, Bethnal Green & Bow). Mr Flynn offers a large collation of political anecdotes entitled “Tales of the Terrace”.

Mr Flynn’s views on politicians are indexed into two categories: “Turkeys” or “Heroes”. But the Labour MP Paul Flynn (Newport West), yesterday took Mr Campbell at his word and launched the most comprehensive website of any MP. Already containing over 500 pages, Mr Flynn promises to add 2,000 words a week. Mr Benn thinks that his Bill is the most practical way of halting the slide to a presidential system of government.ALASTAIR CAMPBELL may be celebrating his suggestion that politicians be allowed to broadcast their views, unedited, without interpretation by journalists or interruptions by rude interviewers.

Most prime ministerial power is not actually accountable to Parliament as it is exercised on behalf of the sovereign. “No thank you, I once met Gordon Brown and that was quite sufficient.”Taken more seriously than ever before, MPs on all sides are beginning to warm to Mr Benn’s latest proposal contained in a Bill he is shortly to present to the Commons, transferring the crown prerogatives exercised by the Prime Minister over to the control of Parliament. Afterwards he attended the House Magazine/Channel 4 “Oscars” to receive the Speechmaker of the Year award from the Speaker, Betty Boothroyd. As befits a true democrat the award was decided on the votes of fellow MPs from all parties. To general approbation, Mr Benn said: “To catch the Speaker’s eye is one thing; to do it with the approval of the House of Commons is unheard of.”During the proceedings Mr Benn spied Charlie Whelan, whom he had never met But he courteously declined an offer to be introduced. Harold Macmillan said Lloyd George gave him the best advice – stick to one point or one question.TONY BENN was in exuberant and impish mood after a week in which he was feted by fellow parliamentarians. First he attended an unveiling of a portrait of himself in the Parliament Street office block of MPs.