Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what steps his Department is taking to assist the Central Bank of Bangladesh in repatriating UK-based assets diverted illegally from that country.

The UK is committed to assisting investigative, prosecuting and judicial authorities in combating international crime. We have robust illicit finance legislation and instruments which can be used to support asset recovery requests. We would not comment on any individual Asset Recovery cases but we are in discussions with the International Anti-Corruption Coordination Centre hosted by the UK's National Crime Agency and the International Centre for Asset Recovery on how to support the Interim Government of Bangladesh. In October 2024, the UK National Crime Agency visited Dhaka as part of the UK's effort to support Bangladesh in this area, as well as wider engagement on law enforcement issues. We will continue to support these recoveries to the extent that we can.