>>5252332 LB
The Corinthia is a laughably obvious place for the UK spook community to teem and fester. Read carefully: what the hell is MI9? And is the UK government now operating with Malta (!!!), Libya and Dubai, the present owners? Think of all the access to intelligence, and how easily accessible it would be.
Check out this hotel's web page. Absolutely gorgeous, flawless decor. There is ZERO chance that hotel is operating at a profit, no matter what the guest rates are, without a steady stream of money coming from somewhere.
Easy to do high-end remodeling when your "clients" are Malta, Libya, and Dubai. Imagine how easy it would be to cover any amount of shady operations under the chaos created by major remodeling and construction.
Wiki: "The Corinthia Hotel London, at the corner of Northumberland Avenue and Whitehall Place in central London, is a luxury hotel and former British Government building, located on a triangular site between Trafalgar Square and the Thames Embankment.
Originally built as the Metropole Hotel, its location close to the Palace of Westminster and government offices in Whitehall meant it was commandeered in both world wars. After the Second World War, it was purchased by the Ministry of Defence and used as government offices until it was declared surplus to requirements and sold by Crown Estates in 2007. It was then restored as a hotel and renamed the Corinthia Hotel London, a combination luxury hotel and residential building.
Commissioned by the Gordon Hotels company, construction was started in 1883.
The Prince of Wales, later King Edward VII entertained guests at the hotel on various occasions, having a reserved box in the ballroom and using the Royal Suite, thought to have been the first floor rooms with bowfronted windows fronting Whitehall Place.
World War I
The hotel was requisitioned in the run-up to World War I to provide accommodation for government staff, together with the other hotels and buildings in Northumberland Avenue, including the Constitutional Club and the offices of the Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge.
When the government redeveloped buildings at Whitehall Gardens in mid-1936, they leased the entire hotel for £300,000pa, to provide alternate office accommodation initially for the Ministry of Labour and the Ministry of Transport, and later for the Air Ministry and the Ministry of Defence.
World War II
About to hand back the building, the government extended the lease by again requisitioning the building in the build-up to World War II. Again a home for various departments, room 424 became the first home for MI9 and its sub-division the Special Operations Executive, and later the holding point for one of the model planning beaches for Operation Overlord.
Metropole building
Purchased from Gordon Hotels after World War II, it was transferred to the Crown Estates portfolio. Controlled by the Ministry of Defence, who used it as an overflow building to its main Whitehall complex, by 1951 the Air Ministry was again a major occupant. From the mid-60s until 1992 it housed the bulk of the Defence Intelligence Staff, the remainder of the analysts and the DIS central staff being sited in the MoD Main Building. In the James Bond comic strip in the Daily Express the artist Yaroslav Horak quite often depicted the Metropole Building as MI6 HQ. Subsequently, the MoD used the building during various refurbishments, when the mirrored ballroom provided the setting for Press Conferences and other major events.
Corinthia Hotel
Having stood unoccupied since 2004, in 2007 the Metropole Building and the adjoining 10 Whitehall Place were acquired for a sum of £130M by a consortium owned equally by Malta's IHI plc and two of its principal shareholders, the Libyan Foreign Investment Company and Nakheel Hotels of Dubai. In September 2008 City of Westminster council approved development of the two buildings as a hotel and residential complex.
The building reopened in 2011 managed by Corinthia Hotels International. 10 Whitehall Place has been converted to 12 residences, and a spa run by Espa.
In a nod to its past, the official announcement of the James Bond movie Skyfall was made at a press conference held at the Corinthia Hotel on 3 November 2011.