Financial Transparency Coalition

The G8 have just released an ambitious and comprehensive asset recovery action plan as part of the Deauville Partnership with Arab Countries in Transition. It is timely and necessary to reinforce the momentum behind stolen asset recovery processes. The first step by G8 countries was to freeze the accounts of the authoritarian leaders Mubarak, Ben Aliand Gaddafi after their fall from power last year, based on the allegation that the assets held had been illicitly acquired from state coffers. However, there has been too little progress made in returning those assets.

Wednesday's daily news updates from Global Financial Integrity

Officials in Switzerland have opened criminal proceedings against Libyan and Syrian citizens suspected of holding ill-gotten funds in Swiss bank accounts. Suspicious deposits in Swiss banks from the MENA region increased to record levels during the Arab Spring events of 2011, when wealthy citizens hoped to protect assets abroad. However, according to an anti-money laundering agency’s report, much of the laundered money came from top officials. Although the involved Swiss banks have frozen assets that allegedly belong to these officials, neither the agency nor the Swiss government is certain of the laundered money’s origin or sum.

Monday's daily news updates from Global Financial Integrity