For Immediate Release
December 17, 2004

Contacts:
Alejandra Slatapolsky (press)
Barbara Schpilberg (conference inquiries)
Telephone: (305) 530-0500

Leader of new Middle East terrorist financing task force will speak at Money Laundering Alert’s March conference

Muhammad Baasiri, the first president of the new Middle East-North Africa terrorist financing task force has confirmed that he will speak at Money Laundering Alert’s 10th Annual International Money Laundering Conference in early March 2005.

Baasiri heads the Middle East-North Africa Financial Action Task Force, called MENA -FATF, which was launched in November and is composed of representatives of 14 nations including Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Syria, United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, which serves as the headquarters.

“Member countries of MENA FATF-FATF will have an excellent chance to participate with other standard-setting organizations in formulating anti-money laundering and terrorist financing policies and standards,” said Baasiri, a senior official of Lebanon’s nation’s principal anti-money laundering agency, the Special Investigation Commission.

Baasiri will speak at Money Laundering Alert’s three-day conference, which runs from March 2 to 4, 2005 at the Weston Diplomat Resort & Spa in Hollywood, Florida, just north of Miami Beach. He’ll explore the status of anti-money laundering and terrorist financing efforts in the region and the challenges MENA-FATF faces in implementing international standards, treaties and agreements on those issues.

The MENA-FATF is modeled after the Paris-based Financial Action Task Force, the principal international watchdog on the global money laundering control effort.

The conference is the largest and most renowned of its kind in the world. It will feature more than 50 AML and terrorist financing experts from around the world speaking on 31 panels. In addition, more than 50 companies that offer AML software, products and services will sponsor events and appear in an Exhibition Hall. The conference drew 972 attendees from 54 countries last year.

Panels will focus on hot topics such as Islamic banking, lessons learned from the scandals of Riggs Bank, AmSouth, ABN Amro and Terrabank, the “long arm” of the U.S. money laundering laws, how offshore havens (including Delaware) serve money launderers, what to do with the proceeds of foreign official corruption and many others. The panels will provide guidance on best practices to follow in complying with the USA Patriot Act and the regulations the U.S., UK, and other countries have issued since 9/11.

The conference uses a lively audience-participation format by which expert moderators pose their own questions and allow attendees to pose questions to the panelists. The conference provides free, simultaneous English-to-Spanish translation for all sessions.
Full information about the conference may be found on this site, including a full list of the panels and speakers.

The full color conference brochure is also available at the website.

Miami-based Money Laundering Alert and Moneylaundering.com Premium are the world’s foremost sources of money laundering news, analysis and guidance. In addition to the annual international conference in South Florida, Money Laundering Alert and Moneylaundering.com Premium also conduct annual money laundering conferences in Latin America and Europe.

(Accredited members of the press may obtain credentials by contacting Alejandra Slatapolsky at aslatapolsky@moneylaundering.com or by calling (305) 530-0500.)