Kudos to Estonia and Latvia

Google headlines:

Estonia has become one of the first countries in the EU to label Russia's actions in Ukraine as genocide.

The country's parliament, the Riigikogu, voted in favour on Thursday of recognising Russia's war as a "genocide against the Ukrainian people", calling on other governments and international organisations to "do the same."

  EuroNews

Yes.

Genocide is defined in international law as the targetted killing of people from a particular national, ethnic, racial or religious group, with the intention of destroying that group.

[...]

Latvia echoed Estonia's declaration on Wednesday afternoon, also recognising Russia's actions in Ukraine as a "genocide."

Estonian investigators say [Jevgeni Agnevštšikov] was one of 19 people on Danske Bank Estonia’s foreign banking team who they believe laundered more than US$1.6 billion of illicit funds for their clients.

The money allegedly originated in eight schemes in Russia, Azerbaijan, the U.S., Iran, Switzerland, and Georgia, as well as a scam that defrauded Facebook out of nearly $100 million. It flowed through Danske Bank Estonia accounts between 2007 and 2015, when the bank was at the center of one of Europe’s largest ever money laundering scandals.

[...]

“To date, a total amounting to 10 million euros in assets of suspects and third parties enriched by the proceeds of crime have been seized to secure the confiscation requirements of the state,” she added.

[...]

Investigators say the system was so effective that several of the bankers continued to use it after Danske Bank Estonia closed its foreign banking division, when they took clients with them to other Estonian banks or switched to working with Latvian banks. Some allegedly continued to launder money even after they were questioned by investigators in December 2018.

  OCCRP

Guess who was using Danske bank in Estonia? That's right. Vladimir Putin. And here's a name you might have heard:

Close to $150 million that they are accused of laundering allegedly came from a huge Russian tax fraud scheme known as the Magnitsky case. It was named after the lawyer who discovered it, Sergey Magnitsky, who worked for a U.S asset manager that had been inadvertently used in the fraud. But when Magnitsky reported it to Russian authorities he was thrown in jail, where he died of mistreatment.

"Mistreatment". Otherwise known as torture. And guess who was involved in negotiations to possibly repeal the Magnitsky Act? That's right: Donald Trump Jr, in that infamous Trump Tower meeting.

All the criminal authoritarians are connected.