| Russia steps up fight against terrorist financing Changes are coming again on the anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing front. Yesterday, Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin said that the possibility of tightening the relevant legislation is being considered.
There is hardly any doubt that the desire to devote maximum effort and resources to blocking the channels of financial support for terrorists arose in the government after a series of terrorist attacks in late August - early September: explosions near the Rizhskaya metro station and on board two airliners, and the taking of hostages in Beslan. Against the background of the general intensification of anti-terrorist actions, it would be simply ridiculous not to try to deprive the ideologists of terrorism of at least part of the money with which they hire performers, buy weapons, explosives, etc. “Every blocked dollar, every blocked ruble means people’s lives saved,” Mr. Kudrin said at a representative international seminar on countering the financing of terrorism in the Euro-Asian region that opened yesterday in Moscow.
It turns out that the domestic anti-money laundering legislation adopted two and a half years ago, which has already been improved twice, including in the area of combating the financing of terrorism, is softer in a number of fundamental provisions than in many other countries, for example in the United States. Moreover, the government seems to already know how to patch up the holes.
“The practice of the first years of work (in the field of combating money laundering and terrorist financing. - Ed. ) shows where legislation can be strengthened,” said Mr. Kudrin. However, neither Mr. Kudrin nor the head of the Federal Service for Financial Monitoring (FSFM) Viktor Zubkov said exactly how the “strengthening” would happen. The head of the Ministry of Finance only made it clear that control over financial flows will become stricter, there will be more opportunities to block suspicious transactions and freeze accounts. However, given the delicacy of the issue, no one is going to cut from the shoulder. “We are now studying all aspects that could be introduced without compromising business and human rights,” reassured Alexey Kudrin.
Since the creation of Russian financial intelligence, discussions have periodically arisen about whether banking secrecy is still maintained in Russia, or whether any operation, any account can become known to the FSFM, and through it to law enforcement and tax authorities. One day, Viktor Zubkov avoided answering a direct question from a Vremya Novostei correspondent about whether banking secrecy applies in Russia. He left for obvious reasons. Not a single official in any country in the world can give a negative answer, and Mr. Zubkov, apparently, was prevented from saying “yes” by the true state of affairs. The fact is that the department headed by him today receives information about all monetary and property transactions amounting to over 600 thousand rubles. (or their currency equivalent). Moreover, in addition to banks, a dozen more categories of organizations are required to inform the FSFM, including insurance companies, professional participants in the securities market, companies managing investment and non-state pension funds, postal organizations, pawnshops, leasing companies, realtors, dealers in precious metals and jewelry, organizers of sweepstakes, bookmakers and lotteries.
In other words, Zubkov’s people know, if not everything, then a lot. How this knowledge is used can be judged by the sad story of Sodbiznesbank, which lost its license for violating anti-money laundering legislation. However, not everything is so bad. Financial intelligence officers are legally prohibited from sharing - including with law enforcement and tax authorities - information not related to money laundering or the financing of terrorism. In other words, the lion's share of “dispatches” received by the service is buried there. It is no coincidence that a month ago, at a banking forum in Nizhny Novgorod, Viktor Zubkov stated that the FSFM is committed to maintaining confidentiality when working with the information provided. By the way, at the same forum he said that the Russian list of those who may be associated with the financing of terrorism today includes about a thousand individuals and 124 legal entities. And banks have all this information.
Russian financial intelligence officers, in an attempt to close loopholes for “dirty” money and cut off the financial supply channels for terrorist organizations, seem to know no rest. They even came up with the idea of creating, under the auspices of the FATF (the world's main anti-money laundering force), the Eurasian Group on Combating Money Laundering and the Financing of Terrorism (EAG). Our financial intelligence officers want all countries surrounding Russia to join the common cause.
The founding meeting of the new organization will take place today as part of a seminar. In addition to Russia, it will include CIS countries that are not members of any of the existing international anti-money laundering organizations. These are Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan. China will keep them company. Moreover, Russia is ready to sacrifice budget money for the establishment of a new structure: $1 million by the end of 2004 and as much more, and maybe more, in 2005. At least Alexey Kudrin said yesterday that the Russian budget is quite capable of allocating $2 million for these purposes. The money will be spent on training local personnel and software. Mikhail VOROBYEV |
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