In collaboration with Roger Hamilton-Martin

LONDON–Luxury newly-built apartments in prestigious neighbourhoods belong to companies linked to a Cambodia-based conglomerate alleged by a recent major journalistic investigation to be involved in serious crime, which it denies.

As buttoned-down American diplomats and their bag-carriers bustle in and out of their new embassy in Battersea, London, little do they know that right across the pavement, looking over from a swish apartment block called the Legacy Building, are 10 flats owned by a man with strong links to a Cambodian conglomerate that a recent media investigation alleges is involved in fraud, money laundering and other crime.

The building was created as part of the wider redevelopment of Battersea Power Station and its surroundings, now known as Nine Elms. Among the perks for residents of the Legacy Building is access to London’s “most exclusive rooftop” featuring the “Sky Pool”, a 25-metre-long glass swimming pool suspended between two blocks.

In addition to the 10 luxury flats at the Legacy Building, owned through a UK company called Unstoppable Bird Limited, the same person also owns Sky Sailing Limited in the UK, which in turn is the owner of seven apartments at the Centre Point tower in Tottenham Court Road, a well-known landmark in central London, according to property and corporate documents reported here for the first time.

The two companies are registered at the same address and their owner is Wei Ren Qiu, a Cambodian national who also declared Cypriot citizenship, according to public corporate data.

16 of the 17 flats have a leasehold start date of 31 March 2021, and the lease for the other apartment starts on 12 March 2021, indicating that they were all bought at roughly the same time. The total price was £26,655,900, and all leaseholds are for 999 years, according to British land registry documents. 

The Centre Point residences are located in an iconic skyscraper in the heart of Central London, by Tottenham Court Road station. Marketing material describes “panoramic views” of St Paul’s Cathedral, Tower Bridge, and other London landmarks visible from the tower.

Wei Ren Qiu, the lucky landlord, appears in the Cambodian corporate registry as the co-owner of Prince Vanguard Development Limited, alongside Chen Zhi, another Cambodian national of Chinese origin. Chen Zhi is chairman of the Prince Group, a Southeast Asian real estate, financial and consumer services conglomerate which, according to a Radio Free Asia (RFA) series of articles, has been investigated by Chinese police regarding alleged money laundering and illegal gambling operations.

A 2024 documentary by ABC Australia linked Prince Group to a covert attempt to rendition a dissident Chinese cartoonist from Japan to Cambodia, in order to have him extradited to China at the behest of Chinese security services. Prince Group denied any knowledge of, or involvement in this affair.

RFA’s series reported on a set of Chinese criminal court judgments from 2020 to 2022 which included description of the Prince Group as a “notorious transnational online gambling criminal group”.

Chinese police investigations resulted in at least seven judgments “convicting low-level Prince Group or Prince Group-linked employees of gambling and money laundering offences”, according to RFA. Court documents cited by RFA suggest that hundreds of millions of dollars of Prince Group funds are from illegal gambling. 

RFA separately reported that Wei Ren Qiu is a partner of Chen Zhi’s in a Cuban cigar business.

Meanwhile, Intelligence Online, a Paris-based publication, said in a December 2022 article that Wei Ren Qiu was “Chen Zhi’s main lieutenant,” adding that Prince Group had faced “slave labour scandals involving Vietnamese and Malaysian workers allegedly forced to work in mass cyber fraud.”

Another RFA article reported allegations of human trafficking and cyberscams at a compound developed by the Prince Group. The compound was until recently listed on the “property distribution map” of a Prince Group subsidiary website. In its response to the article, the conglomerate said the subsidiary “completed construction and relinquished control and possession” of the development in 2020. 

Neither Chen Zhi nor Wei Ren Qiu are alleged to have committed any crimes. Prince Group has strongly denied wrongdoing, rejecting the assertion that the Beijing task force had been investigating it and telling RFA it believed the allegations were a result of “impersonation by criminal elements”. It has published three separate statements on its website criticising the broader reporting and denying the allegations in the articles. The statements also said that the group has retained the services of a law firm and “reserves its right to legal action to protect its reputation and further respond to the article at the appropriate juncture”.

The Prince Group’s head of communications told Reporter that the conglomerate rejects all the allegations and RFA “has a clear geopolitical agenda”. He added: “Unfortunately, it appears that Prince Group has, unjustifiably, fallen into the cross-fire of RFA’s latest agenda against Chinese influence in Cambodia.  This is unfortunate because Prince Group is a strictly Cambodian company with no foreign ownership or influence.”

“Prince Group has established its reputation over many years for its solid business practices and achievements. Having worked with us, our business partners know these allegations are biased and untrue,” the company representative said over email. “In particular, our recent clarifications have outlined the baseless nature of allegations concerning purported human trafficking, illegal gambling, and criminal activity. These statements detail our refutations of these claims and underscore that no legal proceedings, convictions, or findings have been issued against Prince Holding Group or its leadership in any jurisdiction.  More specifically, we conduct all activities in full compliance with applicable laws and standards, including stringent regulatory practices in markets like the United Kingdom. Our operational practices are guided by a commitment to transparency, ethical conduct, and lawful business practices. Claims suggesting otherwise lack basis and are misleading, particularly when no violations or non-compliance issues have been substantiated.”

Chinese authorities had convicted some individuals who worked for Prince Group, and others who worked for companies linked to Prince, like Jin Bei, a Sihanoukville-based casino business in Cambodia, Radio Free Asia said. The media outlet added that Jin Bei was a key part of the Prince Group. Prince Group representatives told RFA that Jin Bei is no longer part of their holdings.

“Local Cambodians know that criminal gangs often attempt to impersonate Prince Group and other major companies, in order to deceive their victims. This does not mean that they are in fact part of Prince Group. Prince Group has no involvement in such criminal activities and, given the scale of our projects and business interests, it would be incredibly foolish for Prince Group to take such risks. Prince Group has a strict internal prohibition against breaching the laws of any countries it operates in,” the Prince Group executive said in reply to Reporter’s request for comment.

“We would advise caution in republishing defamatory statements that could be damaging to the reputations of Prince Holding Group and its executives. We believe that repeating unverified claims from questionable sources risks undermining journalistic integrity and may expose your publication to legal repercussions. Prince Holding Group reserves its legal rights to protect its reputation and address any propagation of defamatory content,” the Prince Group spokesman said. The spokesman did not reply to questions about the purpose of the real estate investments in the UK.

Wei Ren Qiu is listed in UK Companies House files as the director and ultimate beneficial owner of Unstoppable Bird Limited and Sky Sailing Limited, the companies that own the London flats. Reporter has seen a Cambodian naturalisation certificate for Wei Ren Qiu matching his date of birth to that registered at Companies House.

Reporter has also identified a businessman who claims on his LinkedIn profile to have represented the owners of Sky Sailing Limited in London, and prior to that, to have held a senior job at Jin Bei. 

Wei Ren Qiu and Chen Zhi are also co-directors in a Hong Kong business whose documents, reviewed by Reporter, match Wei Ren Qiu’s personal details given in the UK corporate records.

Buying property in bulk from the developer has more advantages than just a potential discount – it also avoids some of the bureaucracy usually involved in such acquisitions. Thanks to a quirk in anti-money laundering regulations, developers are not subject to the same requirements as real estate agents or lawyers, according to Ben Cowdock, head of investigations at Transparency International in London.

The UK property market is a “prime destination” for suspect funds from around the world, Cowdock told Reporter. New-build homes are particularly vulnerable to obscure funds as there are fewer checks carried out on buyers, with developers not covered by anti-money laundering rules, he said.

“While there are strict requirements for lawyers to know their customers and their sources of funds, it’s clear there are too many instances where they either don’t ask enough questions or don’t have a clue,” Cowdock said.

There is no suggestion Wei Ren Qiu has acquired the British properties at Centre Point and the Legacy Building with the intention of avoiding compliance checks.

One other company owned by Chen Zhi, Amiga Entertainment, was refused a bank account in the Isle of Man because it did not provide enough detail about the origin of its funds, RFA reported. The Prince Group denied any connection to Amiga Entertainment, according to RFA.

Notwithstanding the legitimate reasons why developers and their clients, such as Wei Ren Qiu, are exempt from such verifications, Cowdock called for a change in the rules. “To better protect the property market from suspect funds, the Government should extend anti-money laundering regulation to developers, and encourage regulators to crack down on law firms carrying out insufficient checks on their clients.”

Radio Free Asia also reported that Chen Zhi owns an office building in the City of London, on Fenchurch Street, where a Vodafone shop is open on the ground floor, next to the landmark “Walkie Talkie” tower. Reporter confirmed the ownership using UK land registry documents and Companies House files. Noble Title Limited is the company that owns the building, which Chen Zhi bought in 2020 for £90 million, according to corporate data and land registry files.

Roger Hamilton-Martin is a a freelance journalist and a reporter at the Financial Crime Digest, a monthly journal published by Aperio Intelligence, a London-based consultancy.

Special thanks to B.M. for his help editing and fact-checking the article.