Archive
International News Services archives articles supplied to clients one year or more after initial publication. These articles are protected by a password and not made available to readers without permission from clients. They are used as a background resource by agency journalists. Upon client requests, International News Services will remove such articles from the archive or not upload them in the first place. They are included to demonstrate the breadth of topics undertaken by the agency and also to help promote clients’ coverage.
SMALL EUROPEAN STATES - MONACO MONEY LAUNDERING
BY KEITH NUTHALL
MONACO is all about money. A glamorous speck of high-rises looming above the French Riviera, it is famous for wealthy glamour, tax exiles, racing-cars and gambling. Given this cocktail, it is hardly surprising that this, Europe’s second smallest country by geography, has attracted allegations that it has been the site of money laundering.…
CUSTOMS FEATURE
BY ALAN OSBORN
MANY professions are engaged in the war against money laundering but it seems increasingly plain that customs officers are at the very forefront of the campaign. Most crime (with some forms of terrorism a conspicuous exception) is committed mainly for financial profit and that profit has to be re-cycled if the criminals are to gain anything at all from it.…
CARIBBEAN FEATURES
BY MARK WILSON
AWASH with recently-passed legislation and newly-established Financial Investigation Units, the small nations of the Caribbean have transformed their money laundering controls since the mid-1990s. In 2000, five Caribbean island jurisdictions made up one-third of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) list of fifteen non-cooperative countries and territories, each of them with ‘serious systemic problems,’ in the words of a FATF review published on June 22 of that year.…
MYANMAR FEATURE
BY MARK ROWE
WHEN anti-money laundering officials draw up their lists of most notorious nations, Burma – or Myanmar by its official name – is routinely identified as one of the murkiest epicentres of money laundering. Ignore the fact that Burma has only been classified as a non-cooperative country or territory (NCCT) by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) anti-money laundering body for just three years.…
ALBANIA FEATURE
BY MARK ROWE
Mention Albania and money and one is drawn back to the extraordinary pyramid schemes that gripped the country in the mid-1990s as it emerged into a post-Stalinist dawn. Albanians poured in funds with an enthusiasm as remarkable as it was misguided.…
ALBANIA FEATURE - MONEY LAUNDERING
BY MARK ROWE
MENTION Albania and money, and the image that comes to mind is of the extraordinary pyramid schemes that gripped the country in the mid-1990s as the country stepped out into a post-Stalinist dawn. Albanians poured their assets into the schemes, with an enthusiasm that was as remarkable as it was misguided.…
MONEY LAUNDERING REPORT
BY KEITH NUTHALL
INTERNATIONAL crime is usually a cat-and-mouse game, with the criminals staying one step ahead of law enforcement. Maybe nowhere is this truer than with money laundering, where ever more elaborate scams are devised to make dirty money smell of roses.…
TAIWAN FEATURE
BY EDWARD PETERS
DEPENDING on who you ask, Taiwan is either a renegade province or to all intents and purposes an independent nation, albeit one that currently lacks full international recognition. To suggest that it could be a fully functioning country in its own right to anyone in Beijing – the capital of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) – is tantamount to treason.…
MATERNITY PAY CASE
BY KEITH NUTHALL
PAY rises awarded to pregnant workers must be taken into account when working out their maternity leave pay, even if the increase took place just before they stop work to have a baby, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) has ruled.…
EU STAFF REFORM
BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has reformed its staff regulations, replacing a system that primarily linked pay increases to service time with more performance related salary rises. This old set up allowed some automatic pay increases of 38 per cent over 16 years in jobs, without any performance related promotion.…