Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit (BFIU) has taken various measures to prevent money laundering as well as terrorist financing, in order to ensure stability and integrity in the country's financial system.
"We're working continuously to handle the problem," Md Masud Biswas, head of the BFIU, the central agency to combat money laundering and terrorist financing in Bangladesh, told the Financial Express (FE) in an exclusive interview recently ahead of its 20th anniversary.
On June 18, 2002, the BFIU started its journey, aiming to combat money laundering and terrorist financing in Bangladesh.
Actually, a majority of the laundered money from Bangladesh is being channelled through mis-invoicing, which is popularly known as trade-based money laundering, according to the BFIU boss.
As part of the moves, the BFIU has already issued guidelines on Trade Based Money Laundering and instructed all the scheduled banks to comply with the instructions properly.
The bankers, who deal with foreign trade, are being provided special training to enhance their skills and raise awareness regarding trade-based money laundering, Mr Biswas added.
"We've already taken initiatives to enhance our BFIU's monitoring capacity with the assistance of Bangladesh Bank," he said, while replying to a query.
When asked about the amount of laundered money, the BFIU chief said it was a very tough job to estimate the exact amount of laundered money for any country.
But the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crimes (UNODC) has already started a project to study illicit financial flow from Bangladesh, said Mr Biswas.
The Bangladesh government has consent and support in this project and different ministries and agencies are now working with the UNODC under the project where BFIU is acting as focal point, he further said.
Regarding illegal 'hundi' activities using mobile financial services (MFS), he said the BFIU had already found that many of the MFS agents were involved in hundi activities.
According to the findings of BFIU, the respective MFS providers or the banks have already cancelled the agentships of those agents, he added.
"We've also provided the list of the accused agents to the law enforcement agencies for taking necessary actions."
Different units of the law enforcement agencies are working relentlessly regarding the issue and have done some special drives to deter hundi activities, according to the BFIU chief.
"The flow of inward remittances increased gradually, which is a good sign for the economy of Bangladesh, following the government's initiatives against hundi activities," Mr Biswas noted.
The BFIU chief also talked about the government's action plan to bring back the laundered money from overseas countries, saying that the process of repatriation of laundered money was like a relay race and was very complex.
"As a financial intelligence agency, the responsibility of BFIU is to collect information of the launderer and laundered money or assets from the foreign counterparts and provide that information to the investigation agencies concerned," he said, while replying to another query.
Mr Biswas also said the BFIU had already collected information from Canada, USA, UK, UAE, Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia and different European countries including Switzerland and the collected information had been sent to the respective agencies.
During the last five years, the BFIU made 801 such requests to the foreign FIUs.
"As far as I know, some of such cases are under investigation and prosecution," Mr Biswas noted.
About large money laundering cases like Bismillah, Hallmark, Destiny or embezzlers like PK Halder, he said all of such cases had been detected by the BFIU and the central bank of Bangladesh.
"If any instance of money laundering or terrorist financing is being detected by BFIU during the time of inspections or analysis of STR (suspicious transaction report)/SAR (suspicious activity report), or if any of such information is received from other sources, BFIU spontaneously disseminate that information or intelligence report to the respective investigating agencies as per Money Laundering Prevention Act, 2012 for further course of action," he explained.
In financial year (FY) 2020-21, the BFIU disseminated 1,481 intelligence reports or financial information with the Law Enforcement Agencies (LEAs), while 903 in FY 20.
"We also take into consideration the news of any money laundering or terrorist financing published in different media and newspapers. You might be delighted to know that based on the media news 83 intelligence reports were disseminated with the LEAs in the last three years," he noted.
"It's very satisfactory news that the honourable court has given verdict in several money laundering cases, including Destiny, Unipay2you, Hallmark and Bismillah Group."
The BFIU has connections with 23 ministries, divisions and agencies through 'goAML' message board, which serves as a secured platform for information exchange, said Mr Biswas.
The goAML is the UNODC's standard software system available for financial intelligence units to manage and analyse the information received from the reporting organizations (ROs) of BFIU.
Furthermore, it serves as a smooth and secure information exchange tool between the ROs and also between the BFIU and the stakeholder agencies.
In 2002, Bangladesh became the first country in South Asia to promulgate the Money Laundering Prevention Act in line with the recommendations from the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), an intergovernmental organisation which sets international standards aiming to prevent money laundering and terrorist financing.
"In line with the government's 'Zero Tolerance' policy against corruption, terrorism and terrorist financing, the BFIU along with the concerned agencies is working together to fight against money laundering and root out the problem of terrorist financing from the soil of Bangladesh," added Mr Biswas.
Mr Biswas began his career with Bangladesh Bank as an assistant director in 1988. He has 33 years of extensive career with the central bank.
The BFIU boss was born in Chuadanga in a respectable Muslim family on January 18, 1963. He achieved M.Com in Management and also completed an MBA.
