German authorities have seized around 14,000 documents containing details of suspected German tax evaders from private bank Coutts in the Port of Hamburg.
The two containers filled with account details from the Cayman Islands arm of Coutts showed that family members of the Bin Laden clan were among the bank’s clients.
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Coutts, a subsidiary of Royal Bank of Scotland Group, clarified that it had never done business with Osama bin Laden or his immediate family.
The disagreement comes after reports surfaced in European newspapers claiming there might be a link between the state-controlled British lender and the Bin Laden family.
In November 2013, RBS sold its Coutts Cayman operations to law and fiduciary firm Appleby Global. As part of the sale, RBS sent two containers with documents to Geneva from the Cayman Islands two weeks ago, which were searched by the German customs officials at the Hamburg seaport.
A spokesman for Coutts said: "We are not aware of any investigation into our trust company or its papers and we are working with the authorities to allow these papers to continue on their way."
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