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Slush money stashed away in secret Swiss bank accounts and other tax havens across the world has come into sharp focus again, with the Bharatiya Janata Party’s Prime Ministerial candidate, Mr L.K. Advani, underlining the need to end banking secrecy in these countries.

India should become an active player in the global crusade against banking secrecy and tax havens, he said, reiterating that a BJP-led government would seek to bring back the country’s wealth from foreign shores and use it for developmental projects.

“The dimensions of the loot may be denied but not the fact of the loot,” he told mediapersons here on Friday.

He also unveiled the interim report of the party’s task force that, based on studies conducted abroad, estimated the Indian wealth in Swiss bank accounts and other tax havens to be between $500 billion or about Rs 25 lakh crore to $1.4 trillion or Rs 70 lakh crore.

The credibility of the estimate is reinforced by the $11.5 trillion (Rs 575 lakh crore) officially given by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), at the G-20 Summit in London earlier this month, as the amount of global wealth parked in various tax havens, the report said.

via The Hindu Business Line : ‘Rs 70 lakh cr Indian money in Swiss banks, other havens’ .

The Canadian Government will provide an additional aid worth 330,000 USD for an on-going project to fight money laundering run by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) in Vietnam.

An agreement to this effect was signed by Canadian Deputy Foreign Minister Leonard Edwards and UNODC Representative to Vietnam Narumi Yamada in Hanoi on April 17.

The sum has brought the total aid granted by Canada to the 1.03 million USD project to over 700,000 USD.

This move begins a new stage of the Canada-Vietnam cooperation in preventing financial flows from terrorist and criminal groups, said the Canadian Deputy FM at the signing ceremony.

According to Sen. Lieu. Gen. Le The Tiem, Deputy Minister of Public Security of Vietnam, the government has exerted efforts to fight crimes, particularly those involved in money laundering, adding a committee has been set up and a national strategy on the issue is being drafted.

The three-year project, beginning in July 2007, aims to help increase authorised agencies’ capacity in investigating and prosecuting money laundering crimes, and intensify information exchange and international cooperation.

In the first stage, the project with funding of more than 600,000 USD from the United Kingdom and Canada, helped train more than 500 law enforcement and judicial workers and completed a draft plan of action against money laundering to submit to the Government for approval.

According to the project’s coordinator Hon Chan, from now to 2010, the project will help train trainers in localities who in future will directly teach workers, thus increase the effectiveness of the project.

According to UNODC, money laundering crime has become a global issue having impacts on all countries over the world. Vietnam, with booming trade and investment activities, is in need of effective measures to cope with this crime.

via Canada finances anti-money laundering project in Vietnam.

KUALA LUMPUR, April 16 (Bernama) — Efforts to strengthen the anti-money laundering and the combating of the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) regime needs to be intensified to maintain financial stability, according to Bank Negara Malaysia.

Its deputy governor Datuk Zamani Abdul Ghani said robust AML/CFT regimes could benefit individual countries as enhanced financial sector integrity and stability facilitated their integration into the global financial system.

“They will also contribute to more transparent governance and effective fiscal administration,” he said in his keynote address at the International Financial Crime and Terrorism Financing Conference 2009 here today.

Zamani said the lack of AML/CFT regime could contribute to undermine the soundness and stability of financial institutions and systems, discourage foreign investment, and distort international capital flows.

“The global financial crisis amplifies such risks,” he said.

via BERNAMA – Bank Negara: Need To Strengthen Anti-money Laundering Efforts.

Fiserv, Inc. NASDAQ: FISV, the leading global provider of financial services technology solutions, today announced that it was ranked as the top-selling provider of global anti-money laundering AML solutions by IBS Publishing. IBS determined the ranking by analyzing the AML market for the number of new name wins achieved in 2008. Fiserv topped the chart with 117 new name wins.

via Fiserv Ranked #1 in Anti-Money Laundering System Sales for Second Consecutive Year | SYS-CON CANADA.