Category: Counter Terrorist Financing

Kuwait’s measures to combat money laundering and terrorist financing

Counter Terrorist Financing, Money Laundering
Kuwait has an adequate legal and supervisory framework to address illicit finance, but has serious shortcomings delivering effective outcomes, including its understanding, investigation and prosecution of money laundering and terrorist financing. The FATF/MENAFATF mutual evaluation report of Kuwait assessed the effectiveness of Kuwait’s measures to combat money laundering, terrorist financing and proliferation financing, and their level of compliance with the FATF Recommendations. Kuwait is a high-income country with low levels of violent crime but that nevertheless faces money laundering risks from crimes that include fraud, corruption, forgery and offences committed abroad. The country is exposed to terrorist financing risks from…

Inside Hamas’ Pocketbook : Financing Terrorism through online financial platforms

Counter Terrorist Financing, Terrorism
In the wake of the 7 October attack and the war that has followed, Hamas, the Palestinian Islamic resistance movement, has conducted much of its financial activity through established and emerging online financial platforms (OFPs) to support its rule in the Gaza Strip. Even though Hamas is designated as a terror organisation (and is therefore sanctioned) in the US, UK, EU and elsewhere, it has been able to take advantage of compliance-related loopholes and poor counter-terror financing (CTF) practices OFPs suffer from. Some of the OFPs Hamas uses and abuses include technologies such as online payment processors, virtual assets service…

Banana giant held liable for funding paramilitaries

Counter Terrorist Financing, Terrorism
A court in the United States has found multinational fruit company Chiquita Brands International liable for financing a Colombian paramilitary group. The group, the United Self-Defence Forces of Colombia (AUC), was designated by the US as a terrorist organisation at the time. Following a civil case brought by eight Colombian families whose relatives were killed by the AUC, Chiquita has been ordered to pay $38.3m (£30m) in damages to the families. Chiquita said in a statement that it intended to appeal against the jury’s verdict, arguing that there was “no legal basis for the claims”. The jury in the case,…

Treasury Publishes 2024 National Risk Assessments for Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing, and Proliferation Financing

Counter Terrorist Financing, Money Laundering
WASHINGTON – Today, the U.S. Department of the Treasury published the 2024 National Risk Assessments on Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing, and Proliferation Financing. These reports highlight the most significant illicit finance threats, vulnerabilities, and risks facing the United States. The reports detail recent, significant updates to the U.S. anti-money laundering/counter-financing of terrorism framework and explain changes to the illicit finance risk environment. These include the ongoing fentanyl crisis, foreign and domestic terrorist attacks and related financing, increased potency of ransomware attacks, the growth of professional money laundering, and continued digitization of payments and financial services. These assessments also address how…

Bipartisan Anti-Crypto Terror Financing Bill Heads to U.S. Senate

Counter Terrorist Financing, Regulation
A bipartisan group of U.S. senators including Mitt Romney (R-UT) introduced legislation that expands sanctions to foreign entities supporting all U.S.-designated terrorist groups, including through crypto transactions, giving law enforcement an additional toolkit to tackle terror financing.“The Terrorist Financing Prevention Act of 2023, introduced by the Senators, aims to prevent Foreign Terrorist Organizations and their financial enablers, including those using digital assets, from accessing U.S. financial institutions, imposing sanctions and strict regulations to counteract these activities,” the bill reads.The proposed act broadens current sanctions, initially focused on Hezbollah, to include all U.S.-designated foreign terrorist organizations and their supporting foreign entities.…

India: Government weaponizing terrorism financing watchdog recommendations against civil society

Counter Terrorist Financing
Indian authorities are exploiting the recommendations of a global terrorism financing and money laundering watchdog to target civil society groups and activists and deliberately hinder their work, said Amnesty International in a new briefing released today. “Weaponizing counter-terrorism: India’s exploitation of terrorism financing assessments to target civil society” reveals how the recommendations of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF)—a global body responsible for tackling terrorism financing and money laundering—have been abused by the Indian authorities to bring in draconian laws in a coordinated campaign to stifle the non-profit sector. These laws are in turn used to bring terrorism-related charges and,…

FinCEN Proposes New Regulation to Combat Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing

Counter Terrorist Financing, Money Laundering, Regulation
The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) has taken a significant step in the fight against money laundering and terrorist financing by announcing a Notice of Proposed Rule Making (NPRM). This NPRM identifies international Convertible Virtual Currency Mixing (CVC mixing) as a class of transactions of primary money laundering concern. The move comes in response to growing concerns regarding the extensive use of CVC mixing services by various illicit actors worldwide, including state-affiliated cyber actors, cybercriminals, and terrorist groups such as Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). The proposed rule…

Switzerland Probing Hamas Financing: Attorney General

Counter Terrorist Financing
The Swiss judiciary is investigating possible financing of Hamas from Switzerland despite the country not classifying the group as a terrorist organisation, its attorney general said Saturday. The investigation was opened “several weeks” before the October 7 attacks by Hamas on Israel, Stefan Blaettler said, on Swiss public radio station SRF, without revealing further details. The Attorney General’s office later told AFP that the investigation was launched “on suspicion of financing Hamas from Switzerland”. The investigation is expected to be laborious because, unlike the European Union and United States, Switzerland has not placed bans on Hamas. But since the attack,…

MAS – Strengthening Financial Institutions Countering the Financing of Terrorism Controls

Counter Terrorist Financing, Law, Regulation & Guidance, Terrorism
MAS conducted an industry-wide survey of CFT-related controls, and followed up with a series of thematic reviews to assess FIs’ TF risk understanding and examine the effectiveness of their CFT-related controls. This paper sets out MAS’ key observations, and highlights our supervisory expectations that FIs should review against their own controls. FIs should benchmark themselves against the practices and supervisory expectations set out in this paper in a risk-based and proportionate manner, and conduct a gap analysis. In doing so, FIs should give due regard to the risk profile of their business activities and customers. Where FIs observe any gaps…

Financial Crime Watchdog FATF Suspends Russia over Ukraine War

Counter Terrorist Financing, FATF, Money Laundering
PARIS, Feb 24 (Reuters) – Global financial crime watchdog Financial Action Task Force (FATF) suspended Russia’s membership on Friday, saying Moscow’s war in Ukraine violated the organisation’s principles. FATF is an inter-governmental organisation set up to combat money laundering and terrorism financing by setting global standards and checking if countries respect them. “This is the first time a member of FATF is suspended,” FATF President Raja Kumar told a news conference. “Russia is effectively sidelined from the organisation.” Article Credit: https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/financial-crime-watchdog-fatf-suspends-russias-membership-over-ukraine-war-2023-02-24/

European Countries Top of Basel AML Index

Counter Terrorist Financing, FATF, Money Laundering
EUROPEAN countries and New Zealand comprise the Top 10 countries in the Basel Institute AML Index. On the other end of the scale, the bottom 10 are dominated by African countries along with Haiti, Myanmar and Cambodia. Finland – whose FATF assessment was also released today – comes out on top of the ratings with Congo ranked bottom stacking up a rating of 8.3 out of 10 for its money laundering risk. Under the Basel AML Index, countries are assessed under 18 indicators including the quality of their AML/CFT Framework, their Corruption and Bribery Risk, Financial Transparency and Standards, Public…