The New legislation the national bank says will prevent money laundering was approved by parliament this week.
Money laundering is investing money obtained from serious crimes, such as drug trafficking or terrorist activity, into legal enterprises.
All parliamentary groups say a bill is necessary; however, they are concerned with some of its articles.
The main concern is that the bill allows the undermining of doctor-patient, lawyer-client and even legal proclamations and agreements that protect parties from being forced to disclose information about their interactions with clients, if it is believed it would advance an investigation of the Financial Intelligence Center, a federal agency that will be established by the new bill.
The bill also stipulates that suspicious transactions - defined by the bill as those found to be inconsistent with a customer's known legitimate business or personal activities - will be looked into and involved parties will be forced to aide investigations and explain the source.
"It is on the prosecutor that the burden of the proof should rely, not on possible citizens that are all potentially innocent until proven otherwise," MP Temesgen Zewdie said, reflecting some of the opposition MP's concerns regarding the bill they see as awarding too much power to the executive.
Despite the opposition group's refusal to support it, the majority ruling party MPs, aided by some affiliated and independent groups, wrote the bill into law last Thursday.
Source: Nazret
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
0 comments:
Post a Comment