Baruba tells U.S. “Get Lost!”

Millions of West Indians throughout the Caribbean are today queuing outside banks in scorching temperatures trying to retrieve their savings after the collapse of the Stanford financial shell game.

Reuters reports the situation is especially acute in Antigua and Barbuda (not to be confused with Baruba) where the government there is desperately trying to borrow money from Colombian loan sharks to shore up the economy. After admitting it is incapable of covering lost savings due to insufficient funds in the National Bank.

Not coincidentally, incidentally, in the midst of the current economic crunch, the U.S. Justice Department is also targeting banks around the world known to take deposits from wealthy Americans seeking to launder money and evade taxes. FOX News yesterday reported illegal overseas deposits by U.S. citizens currently amount to over $14.8 billion.

“The initial thrust is in Switzerland,” said John Amaretti, CEO of World Fast Cash Inc., a Miami-based competitor to Western Union specialising in international money transfers, “but it won’t be long before all banks get a knock on the vault door.”

A spokesperson for the Royal Bank of Baruba (ROB-BAR) today urged Barubans “to remain calm and go about your business peaceably.”

“There is no risk of your deposits being compromised. We have assets well in excess of those of some leading Swiss banks and as far as the U.S. authorities coming here to investigate our customer list we’ve sent President Obama, Secretary of State Clinton and the U.S. Ambassador to Baruba, a stern text message warning them dire consequences will follow if the threat is carried out.”

As a possible first step Prime Minister Sir Baldwin J. Scantlebury OBE WAN KAN OBE told the Post he is preparing a draft of a bill to be submitted to parliament in emergency session “freezing all American diplomats and government officials currently on the island.”

(After The Post went to press a spokesperson in the PM’s office called to say Mr. Scantlebury had misspoken. He meant to say “all American diplomats and government officials with bank accounts currently on the island.”)