DHAKA: Bangladesh’s customs intelligence authority said on Thursday it had brought smuggling charges against at least a dozen large trading companies after a report said over $9 billion had been illegally moved abroad in 2013.
It has also confiscated from them about 2.0 billion taka ($26 million) and 300 shipping containers with contents valued at over a further one billion taka, a senior official said.
The crackdown came after a report by Global Financial Intelligence (GFI), a United States-based group researching illegal money transfers, estimated a total of $9.6 billion was lost in 2013 through money laundering linked to trade.
“That is a significant amount for the country, almost one-third of Bangladesh’s national budget,” said Moinul Khan, director general of the Customs Intelligence Directorate. “After the GFI report, we are more cautious to prevent such illegal movement of money, goods and humans,” he said. The country’s Money Laundering Prevention Act was amended last year to allow the customs department to investigate and prosecute allegations of money laundering, he added.
The GFI report said 85 percent of money laundering in Bangladesh takes place through fraudulent invoices in trade, Khan added after a two-day workshop for senior officials on fighting such crime.
Mohammad Nojibur Rahman, chairman of the National Board of Revenue (NBR), called money laundering “a global, extensive and complicated problem” with criminals applying the most modern technology and techniques to smuggle illegal funds. “So we have to adopt more modern techniques to stop those and the aim of this workshop is to equip (senior officials) with this spirit.”
