Anti-money laundering body takes stock of progress
Anti-money laundering body takes stock of progress
The National Committee for Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism (AML/CFT) is planning various activities to strengthen their work and achieve further successes.
The committee met in Vientiane on Friday to review their work over t he fourth quarter, assess progress over the past year and draw up an action plan for next year.
The meeting was chaired by Deputy Prime Minister Somdy Duangdy, who is also Minister of Finance and president of the committee, and attended by officials from relevant government agencies.
Last year, the committee achieved success in various areas, particularly the inspection of banks, other financial institutions and suspicious documents, the Anti-Money Laundering Intelligence Unit of the Bank of the Lao PDR (BOL) reported.
In addition, an IT system was developed to facilitate the committee's work with its Lao and foreign partners.
The committee is seeking funding from international organisations for human resources development and is continuing talks about inspection methods and other aspects of AML/CFT with foreign partners, especially Vietnam, Thailand and Cambodia.
In the past few years, the BOL has signed memorandums of understanding on data exchange with several government bodies including the State Inspect ion Authority.
In addition, the BOL works with various Asean countries in technical areas, including Myanmar, Cambodia and other developing countries.
Last year, the central bank signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Korea Financial Intelligence Unit on the sharing of information to prevent money laundering and the financing of terrorism. This was a significant form of international cooperation in actively addressing the central bank's AML/CFT deficiencies.
Next year, the Anti-Money Laundering Intelligence Unit will continue to improve various aspects of its work and regulations, and boost coordination with domestic and foreign partners on information exchange, inspection and analysis methods.
The committee also plans to resolve Laos' shortcomings in implementing its AML/CFT agenda.
Laos is a member of the Asia-Pacific Group on Money Laundering and as such is obliged to implement the Financial Action Task Force's 40 recommendations to meet international standards on anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism.
AML/CFT is a global issue and every country has a responsibility to take action against these crimes based on their own regulations in line with international standards.
