Money Laundering Linked To Environmental Crime
Environmental crimes cover a very wide range of activities, from illegal extraction and trade in forestry and minerals to illegal land clearing and waste trafficking.
All of them are very serious crimes that should not be promoted.
What makes this crime lucrative is the low-risk, high reward nature of the environmental crime, which is seen by criminals as a secure source of income. Since the regulations and legal environment that is not always as severe worldwide. Which sometimes results in it not being possible to prosecute them in court.
The FATF, showing its interest in the subject, carried out a study to raise awareness of the number of criminal profits that are obtained from the hand of laundering techniques for environmental crimes. More than 40 countries’ experience (either good or bad), was considered.
It was emphasized that criminals often mix legal and illegal goods early in resource supply chains to conceal their illicit source, making it difficult to detect suspicious financial flows in the future.
This FATF report makes us note that too many species, such as rosewood, are in danger of extinction, adding to the threat of illegal logging and land clearing.
Strengthen their operational capacity to detect and pursue financial investigations into environmental crimes and implement the FATF standards as an effective tool to combat money laundering from environmental crime is the result of the report. Surely, representatives are discussing new legislation.
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