Tweet Consensus on Supranational Risk Assessment As part of the 4th Anti-Money Laundering Directive approval process in the European Union (the “4th AMLD“), the Council of the European Union’s President yesterday issued declarations and proposals for the regulation of anonymous financial transactions that are transacted on new fintech products. The communication from the President included […]
Tweet The UK’s tough and controversial new counter-terrorism legislation is slated to be reviewed by the House of Lords on Monday before being given Royal Assent in an expedited fashion. The Counter-Terrorism and Security Bill (HC 127) is intended to address a number of pressing terrorism and security issues facing the UK, in particular: (a) home-grown Islamic State […]
Tweet Ransom payments The UK government’s proposed Counter-Terrorism and Security Bill 127 (the “Counter-Terrorism & Security Act“), now at Second Reading in the UK Parliament, will prohibit insurance companies from making ransom payments to terrorists and terrorist organizations. The provision would amend §17, the counter-terrorism financing part of the UK Terrorism Act 2000, to make it […]
Tweet Fourth banks closes remittances businesses Another bank in Australia, the Westpac Bank, has announced it will close its remittance business division next week over the difficulty of complying with counter-terrorism laws. By de-risking and closing its remittance division, the Bank is terminating the bank accounts of all of its business customers who operate money […]
Tweet We’re pleased to announce that Christine Duhaime is giving a presentation on the issue of “How the ATM Network Globally is Unwittingly Used for Terrorist Financing & Ways to Prevent it” at the 2015 Interac Conference in Ottawa. After a spouse of a member of the Islamic State Tweeted to the world from ar-Raqqah, […]
Tweet Anti-Terrorism Act filing against global banks Yesterday, symbolically the day before Remembrance Day, several plaintiffs filed suit against a number of global foreign banks based in the United States under the Anti-Terrorism Act (the “ATA“), including HSBC Holdings Plc, Barclays, Standard Chartered Bank and the Royal Bank of Scotland. The plaintiffs are seeking damages that could […]
Tweet New Anti-Terrorism Measures The Government of Canada released its proposed new anti-terrorism legislation today, entitled the Protection of Canada From Terrorists Act, Bill C-44 (the “PCFT“). The material part of the PCTF amends the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act and is quite short. It does as follows: Clarifies that the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (“CSIS“) has […]
Tweet New proposed terrorism surveillance law The government of Canada will announce proposed legislation tomorrow to increase its counter-terrorism measures in response to the national security threats from the Islamic State. The proposed law will give more power to CSIS agents in Canada to detect and track persons associated with, or suspected to be associated […]
Tweet Terrorist groups are not a financial island This article has been updated and replaced with the White Paper on ISIS’ Terrorist Financing available here.
Tweet Arab Bank case changes anti-money laundering law In a weird twist of law, our global anti-money laundering laws that were designed to bankrupt terrorist organizations, and prevent the flow of illicit funds, may bankrupt many of our banks instead. Early this week, in Linde v. Arab Bank, the Arab Bank was found liable in a […]