INTERNATIONAL DRUG traffickers launder their billions of dollars in illegal profits through a variety of financial systems, including the legitimate banking industry. No less so are those who have set up command and control centres in Jamaica in recent years.
The International Narcotics Control Strategy Report 2003 which was published on March 1 by the U.S. State Department's Bureau of International Narcotics Affairs, points to the exploitation by money launderers of a loophole in Jamaican law through which they move large amounts of cash said to be hundreds of thousands of US dollars at a time through Jamaica, taking advantage of the fact that local law does not require declarations of cross-border movements of currency or monetary instruments.
With a robust Parliament in place, following the October 2002 general election, it is high time that the political directorate acts to remedy the deficiencies in legislation which are now being taken advantage of by money launderers.
The Government's will to tackle money laundering would be demonstrated beyond a doubt by ensuring that the Financial Crimes Unit of the Ministry of Finance which it has set up to identify and investigate money laundering crimes is adequately funded and competently staffed, and not a shell agency, to the unmitigated joy and unimpeded profit of international drug traffickers and their money launderers.
Money laundering is as essential to drug trafficking as the distribution of the illegal drugs themselves is to the global trade. Money laundering has come a far way from the days of the "cocaine cowboys" showing up at banks in South Florida with duffle bags full of money. With the development of technology, money launderers now use sophisticated banking techniques, which include the electronic transfer of money. Once it enters the banking system, it leaves a paper trail that is either near impossible to trace or is extremely time-consuming to follow.
This multi-billion dollar cash business is controlled and managed by well-educated, and higly skilled and experienced international accountants, and of course by their local counterparts.
Globalisation of the drug trade means that we must improve the efficacy and the power not only of our laws but of our financial investigations, as the only way we can effectively tackle the continuing criminal enterprise operated by the international drug syndicates is by attacking their financial base.
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