Antigua and Barbuda Praised Over Anti-Money Laundering Procedures

by Phillip Morton, Investors Offshore.com

31 March 2003

Antigua and Barbuda has received the highest possible praise from the Caribbean Financial Action Task Force (CFATF) over its anti-money laundering policies.

The CFATF was set up with the specific intention of clamping down on money laundering. It has 30 members ranging across the Caribbean and Latin America.

The report has concluded that the legislative framework implemented by the jurisdiction is in total compliance with international standards in addition to being properly enforced.

In order to gain this distinction, 40 FATF conditions had to be satisfied, plus 19 CFATF rules and 25 FATF Non-co-operative countries and territories' criteria.

Sir Ronald Sanders, High commissioner to the UK and CFATF deputy chairman has called Antigua and Barbuda's anti-money laundering measures the best in the region. "Nobody else's CFATF evaluation was as good as Antigua's … we were outstanding," he told the Antigua Sun.

He went on to point out that the process of transforming the culture of compliance was painful, especially given the territory's reputation as a haven for dirty money in the 1990s. As a consequence many banks left the country due to the increase scrutiny they were facing, and the jurisdiction now has only 15 banks compared with over 60 in the mid 1990s. However, Sanders feels that the nation is the better for it, and the legislation introduced has made income from the banking sector far more stable.

"That means we'll keep these businesses longer, we'll get the revenue from them longer, employment will continue longer. With dirty money, either the law catches up with them or they collapse themselves, and there's no predictability." Sanders affirmed.

Sanders also praised the role of the Prime Minister and parliamant in the drive to clean up the jurisdiction's banking practices. He paid particular praise to the opposition who he said could easily have stalled the process by blocking anti-money laundering legislation.

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