EBRD auspices seminar in Baku on actions against money laundering

Given the heightened emphasis on financing terrorism since September 2001, SECO and the EBRD had decided to launch an initiative in the field of anti-money laundering (AML) with the aim to raise the awareness of banks to money laundering throughout the Bank’s countries of operation and to give them the tools to protect themselves. On the occasion of a meeting of EBRD President Jean Lemierre with Swiss Federal Councilor Pascal Couchepin in 2002, the EBRD and Switzerland agreed on a closer collaboration in the domain of AML. From this cooperation was put in place a program of eleven seminars in countries of South-Eastern Europe, Central Asia and the Caucasus financed with SECO funds for a total amount of EUR 495,000.

From May to November 2005, the UK-based firm Lessons Learned conducted the seminars in the following countries: Albania, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bulgaria, Kyrgyz Republic, Romania, Serbia & Montenegro (including in Kosovo), Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. The Azerbaijan event was the last one of the series and gathered representatives of the AML Group at the National Bank of Azerbaijan (NBA), representatives of the Azerbaijan Bank Training Center, as well as senior-level representatives of Azerbaijani commercial banks.
The objectives of the seminar were to raise the awareness of financial institutions and national authorities of the risks connected with money laundering, to give them the tools to protect their institutions from money laundering, and to improve cooperation between banks and law enforcement agencies as a fundamental aspect in the fight against money laundering.
The main lecturer of the seminar was Mr. Tim Parkman, founder and Managing Director of the firm Lesson Learned. Presentations with audio-visual examples were shown, and practical exercises organized involving all participants. The train-the-trainers approach used during the seminar and the practical information and material distributed will enable the participants to in turn organize the necessary training of the staff at their respective institutions. The current situation in Switzerland and Azerbaijan as concerns measures against money laundering and terrorism financing were presented by Mr. Thomas Meyer, Head of the Swiss Cooperation Office in Baku, and Mr. Rufat Aslanli, Head of the Banking Supervision Department at the NBA during their welcoming remarks.

Day.Az