A key company in the York Hannover group, which owns the St. George's Club timeshare units, has been declared bankrupt.

York Hannover Holding AG was formally wound up last Thursday by a court in Lucerne, Switzerland, where it is based.

The action was brought by Bermuda resident Mr. Arthur White, who is owed 750,000 Canadian dollars.

The last straw for the firm came when its largest-known creditor, Rothschild Bank of Zurich (RBZ), withdrew its support, according to a Swiss news agency.

Mr. Marco Mathis, a spokesman for the bankrupt firm, was quoted as saying that York Hannover "regretted'' that RBZ had not supported a restructuring of the property conglomerate.

The group is currently embroiled in a banking scandal involving RBZ, which sacked one of its top officers after breaching Swiss regulations in relation to loans to York Hannover.

Mr. Mathis is a shareholder in York Hannover (Bermuda) Ltd., which has also been wound up after legal action by Mr. White.

York Hannover (Bermuda) was believed to have been an investment arm of the group. York Hannover Holding AG has always been considered the parent company of the property group but, because of the complex structuring of the organisation, nothing is known for sure.

The ownerships of both York Hannover (St. George's), which is the immediate owner of the St. George's Club, and York Hannover (Bermuda) were mysteriously transferred two years ago to a company called York Hannover Curacao NV, in the Netherlands Antilles.

Creditors of York Hannover, whose firms are collapsing all over the world with debts running into hundreds of millions of dollars, suspect that York Hannover Holding AG's assets may have been deliberately stripped.

Information about York Hannover Curacao NV is extremely difficult to obtain because of the strict privacy laws in the Netherlands Antilles and the unco-operative nature of York Hannover's staff.

What is known is that the company was formed in October, 1984, with an issued capital of US$6,000 and that it is managed by Curacao Corporation Company NV (CCC), of the Netherlands Antilles.

Separate inquiries at CCC's offices were referred to Ms Rita Merkies and a Mr.

van der Pols, neither of whom would discuss York Hannover.

The two officers were so secretive that neither would even say what CCC's line of work was and what their positions were in the firm. Mr. van der Pols even refused to give his first name.

They asked for written questions from The Royal Gazette to be faxed to them but, more than a week later, a reply has still not been received.

Meanwhile, the principal creditor of the St. George's Club, Canadian-based Central Guaranty Trust Co., is still waiting for the go-ahead from the Bermuda Government to appoint a receiver to take over the timeshare units.

Central Guaranty wants reassurances about the project's land lease with Government before a receiver is appointed.

Central Guaranty's vice president Mr. Larry Clinesmith said he did not know why there had been a delay but said he was confident a receiver would be appointed soon.