Police officers, prosecutors’ capacity to be enhanced in handling money laundering cases
[youtube url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4T-Qm-k-Zh0″ width=”100%” height=”315″]
─ AG Williams welcomes two-day training at Marriott Hotel
─ training will enhance their capacity to investigate and prosecute cases
─ will encourage collaboration to ensure convictions
DPI, Guyana, Thursday, January 24, 2019
Personnel from the various arms of the security services, namely; police investigators, police prosecutors, the Director of Public Prosecutor’s (DPP) office, Special Organised Crime Unit (SOCU), Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU), State Assets Recovery Agency (SARA) and the attorneys with the Attorney General’s chambers, will benefit tremendously from a two-day workshop on money laundering and asset forfeiture.
The workshop, which began at the Marriott Hotel in Georgetown on Thursday morning, is designed to promote best practices in the successful investigation and prosecution of money laundering cases.
According to the Attorney General (AG) and Minister of Legal Affairs, Basil Williams SC., this training exercise is crucial because money laundering threatens the economic integrity of a country.
“It is an honour to open this workshop as it is an opportunity to bring together investigators and prosecutors and other relevant persons so that we could enhance our capacity to investigate and prosecute money laundering,” AG Williams said.
He noted that areas of money laundering and asset recovery are critically important to the Government of Guyana, as money laundering threatens the economic well-being of any country.
“Once money laundering is allowed to run rampant the end result leads to the erosion of the integrity of our financial institutions, development policies and the moral fabric of our society,” AG Williams added.
The workshop faculty comprises highly experienced prosecutors, investigators and legal analysts who, through lectures and case studies, will demonstrate effective strategies and techniques for investigating and prosecuting simple and complex schemes carried out by criminal enterprises.
The workshop will be an interactive program conducted in a peer-to-peer learning environment.
During 2017, a series of sensitisation outreaches/workshops were hosted across the country in an effort to inform relevant stakeholders on the role they play in reporting any form of suspicious financial transactions by clients or business partners.
Guyana has moved from being blacklisted to being in the fourth round of mutual evaluations to become compliant with the international Financial Action Task Force (FATF) regulations.
Felecia Valenzuela.
Image: Kawise Wishart.
Editor’s note: Financial Action Task Force (FATF) is an intergovernmental organisation that designs and promotes policies and standards to combat financial crime.