MOSCOW - Russian prosecutors are still investigating what happened to a $4.8 billion IMF loan received in 1998 that some claim may have been laundered through a New York bank, the head of the Russian parliament's audit agency said. <br>
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``This work is not finished,'' Sergei Stepashin, an ex-prime minister who now heads the State Duma's Audit Chamber, said Saturday on Russia's state-controlled Mayak radio. ``The sum remains very serious. It's more than $4 billion that we cannot seem to find.'' <br>
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He predicted that the investigation by the Russian Prosecutor-General's office would be complete this year. Russian investigators have not commented publicly on the case. <br>
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Stepashin also said Audit Chamber investigations revealed financial violations by government officials at the time the International Monetary Fund loans were received in 1998 - just months before Russia defaulted on tens of billions of dollars in debt and plunged into financial crisis. Stepashin gave no details of the violations. <br>
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The IMF has said that an audit showed Russia lied to the fund about financial activity in 1996, but it found no evidence that the fund's loans were misused or involved in alleged corruption and money laundering. <br>
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The audit came after U.S. federal prosecutors alleged in 1999 that the Bank of New York had served as a conduit for $7 billion in Russian money. Some reports alleged the funds included IMF loans.
