More laundered money found: BB governor

Dhaka, Feb 5 (bdpremnews.co.cc) – Bangladesh Bank has found more money smuggled out of the country and a move is underway to retrieve all of the smuggled funds, said the central bank's governor Tuesday. Salehuddin Ahmed, who heads a high-level taskforce to detect and retrieve the laundered money, said they had sufficient proofs in hand about the destination of the illegal funds. Your Ad Here "We have proceeded quite far in bringing back the laundered money. Some funds have already been brought back. Some new information about money laundering has been available," the governor told reporters after a meeting of the taskforce. He said they would recover the funds after signing agreements with the central banks of the countries the money had been smuggled to. To do that, Bangladesh needed to be a member of Egmont Group, the international organisation of the Fund Intelligence Unit (FIU), the governor said. "To become member of Egmont Group we would have to change the money laundering law. Initiative has already been taken to amend the law. Now it is in the final stages." Ahmed said Bangladesh would apply for membership of the 106-member group once the law was amended. The governor also said the taskforce had proposed to the government to form a "Central Authority Point" to control all the activities regarding bringing back the smuggled funds. He said the Point can be formed with representatives of different government organisations. The meeting was held at the central bank headquarters at Motijheel in the city. The first meeting of the taskforce was held there on Nov 15 last year. "The taskforce would take assistance from different countries to bring back laundered money through Mutual Legal Assistance (MLA) agreement after becoming member of Egmont Group. "After signing the MLA agreement all information regarding the money laundered could be used in cases. Allegations could be made on the basis of that information," the top banker said. Admitting that the retrieval of the smuggled funds money was a lengthy process, the governor said, "So far about Tk 1,000 crore in laundered money has been brought back. All of the money can be retrieved through continuous effort." He said the money would be deposited to the national exchequer before a decision was reached on how the money would be used. The government on Oct 24 last year formed the taskforce to retrieve illegal funds from abroad. The representatives of the ministries of foreign affairs, home, finance and law, the National Board of Revenue and other government agencies sit on the taskforce.