Wie aan wie leent, is me op dit moment onduidelijk.

Maar zelfs al staat de richting vast, een lening in de jaren 80 is dikwijls eigen zwart geld dat in een parallel bankcircuit gaat en de dag nadien naar dezelfde persoon teruggaat onder de vorm van een witte lening, verstrekt door de daglichtkant van de bank in kwestie. Ergo, als Van Camp geld leent van Rossignol, dan is het msschn een virtuele lening, en zit het zwart geld van Van Camp (of omgeving) misschien ergens in Zwitserland op een rekening van Rossignol. Bij de dood van Van Camp slaat Rossignol dat zwart geld dan scheef en vangt toch nog verdere afbetaling?

Dezelfde opmerking wat Van Cutsem betreft. In die draad kwam de vraag aan Van Cutsem junior waar zijn vader na De Pomp het geld vond om een restaurant te beginnen. Antwoord: een bank was zo vriendelijk geweest. Bedenking: daarom is het nog niet per definitie een reguliere lening, want mogelijk betreft het eigen zwart geld dat gewassen door een vriendelijke bankier terugkeert.

De vader van Rossignol zou ook meer in beeld moeten komen. Die heeft blijkbaar als kennis van Vanden Boeynants veel geld geschept als ambtenaar van de sociale dienst van het leger. Als zou blijken dat de notaris van de erfenis Rossignol ook Lefère is, hebben we weer een puzzelstukje.

In August 1997 a newspaper report indicated that Occidental Airlines, a company based at Ostend Airport was under investigation by the public prosecutor of Bruges. [9] Until 1998 Occidendal Aviation Services NV, as the company was officially registered at the Ostend Commercial Trade Register, had its own large warehouse next to the airport control tower. Although it was pretended that his wife was the owner of the company, a former Belgian airline pilot, Ronald Rossignol, was in fact the owner, together with the British pilot Brian Martin.

Ronald Rossignol is the son of a senior political appointee in the office of P. Van den Boeynants, at the time when the latter was serving as Belgium's Minister of Defence. [10] Ronald Rossignol had, prior to 1980, close connections with Brussels extreme right wing circles. [9] Since 1980 he has been involved in business with the Congo's erstwhile President Mobutu. According to the Belgian newspaper Le Soir, his name appeared on Interpol lists and he was arrested in 1984 in France and accused of fraudulent bankruptcy, to the extent of some BEF 800 million.

Despite the dubious past of R. Rossignol, placed once more under judicial scrutiny, a senior civil servant of the Flemish authorities, Paul Waterlot, responsible for Ostend Airport's promotion and information, eagerly defended R. Rossignol publicly in the press and reaffirmed in the name of the airport's management board, full confidence in the aims of, and the services provided by, Occidental Airlines. [11]

The subject of the judicial investigation was a cargo of nearly forty tonnes of military equipment, to be sent to governmental or rebel forces in Angola. An Avistar Airlines Boeing 707 freighter, Cyprus-registered as 5B-DAZ, was chartered for the trip by Occidental Airlines. Pending a Belgian Customs investigation the consignment, consisting of Dutch Army surplus items, had been impounded in Occidental's warehouse for nine months.

The cargo manifest showed an innocuous cargo of used clothing, vehicle parts and vehicles, but the cargo consisted of twenty tonnes of uniforms, an armoured car, multi-band radios and other equipment needed by a fighting force. After being impounded for nine months, the consignment was granted permission to be exported to England and was merely sent across the Channel by truck without arousing further interest.

On 12 May 1998 the Avistar aircraft took off from the civil airport side of RAF Manston in Kent, UK bound for Africa. The flight plan showed that the aircraft was bound for Kano in Nigeria to refuel and then to its reported final destination of Mmabatho in South Africa. After taking off from Kano, the aircraft temporarily disappeared. It never landed on Mmabatho's runway, actually too short for a fully-laden Boeing 707, but it was observed around 04.00 hours on 13 May on the ground at Cabinda, Angola and reappeared some hours later at Lomé in Togo, empty. [12]

According to the UK newspaper The Observer of 14 March 1999, the same aircraft 5B-DAZ, which in 1997 made some 28 flights from Ostend flew, in December 1998, a cargo of weapons and ammunition from Hermes, the former Slovak state-owned arms' manufacturer in Bratislava, to the Sudan, in breach of an EU embargo. The southern civilian population of the Sudan is subjected to violent oppression on religious grounds.

The money paid by Hermes for the flight was split between the pilot, the crew and Ronald Rossignol, who acted as broker. While on its way for another delivery to the Sudan and again chartered by Rossignol, the aircraft left Bratislava on 7 February 1999, failed to achieve sufficient speed and ploughed into the mud at the end of the runway. Because of its long list of ongoing malfunctions, it was decided not to repair the aircraft.

Ronald Rossignol succeeded in his efforts to remain outside the grip of Belgian justice, which probably had insufficient legal grounds to take him into custody. The incapacity of local justice illustrates clearly the need for comprehensive international legislation and law enforcement, as well as underlining the ease with which arms' brokers are able to take advantage of gaps within and between national legal systems.

Bron » www.ruudleeuw.com

[9] Het Belang van Limburg, 16 August 1997
[10] IPIS brochure 123, page 45
[11] Het Nieuwsblad, 21 August 1997
[12] Fax memorandum, July 1998, British source

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