Chair of Egmont Group of Financial Intelligence Units (FIUs) and Director of the Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC) of South Africa Xolisile Khanyile hailed the steps taken by the State of Qatar in the field of combating financial crimes, money laundering and terrorist financing.
In exclusive statements to Qatar News Agency (QNA) on the sidelines of the panel discussion on partnership between the public and private sectors to combat financial crime, she described the Qatari experience as very good, saying "the assessors from the Financial Action Task Force came out very well. What I can just encourage the people of Qatar is to ensure that you don't relax, you sustain the good performance that you have had and you even do more." She also underlined the success that Qatar has had in building a public-private partnership to combat financial crime, stressing that the public and the private sectors are able to work together and enhance the exchange and the sharing of information so that information reaches law enforcement agencies, which will in turn be able to carry out investigations, prosecutions, and the recovery of assets successfully.
For his part, Head of Qatar Financial Information Unit (QFIU) Sheikh Ahmed bin Eid al-Thani highlighted in his intervention during the panel discussion the experience of the Qatari unit in partnership between the public and private sectors, stressing the importance of this partnership in strengthening the combat system.
He referred to the forum launched by the Financial Information Unit in 2018, which represented a platform for dialogue and co-operation between the public and private sectors.
Sheikh Ahmed bin Eid al-Thani also emphasised the will and the support provided by the concerned authorities in the State of Qatar, in order to achieve a progress in combating financial crimes and terrorist financing.
Director of the Anti-Financial Crimes Department at Qatar Central Bank (QCB) Salem al-Kuwari stressed QCB's keenness to achieve the highest levels of co-operation between the public and private sectors, and for the financial institutions under its supervision to implement the instructions issued by it to enhance reporting processes and submitting high quality suspicious transaction reports (STRs) to the unit.
In turn, Egmont Group Executive Secretary Jerome Beaumont highlighted the partnership between the two sectors in terms of the international standards of the Egmont Group of Financial Intelligence Units (FIUs), calling for the need to provide capabilities to achieve the goals in this field.
In his intervention, Chief Financial Crime Compliance and Governance at QNB Group Riadh Fayech talked about the benefits and risks of this partnership from the perspective of the private sector.
The panel discussion on partnership between the public and private sectors to combat financial crime, hosted by Qatar Financial Information Unit and chaired by Sheikh Ahmed bin Eid al-Thani, discussed a number of issues related to the study of relations between the public and private sectors in terms of access to financial information and financial investigations to protect the local and global economy and the financial system, in addition to identifying best practices and challenges in the field of information exchange between the public and private sectors.
Participants in the panel discussion also proposed measures to develop an effective partnership between the two sectors.
The discussion represented an initiative to strengthen partnerships between the public and private sectors and a forum for authorities concerned with combating money laundering and terrorist financing, QFIU representatives, national supervisory authorities and the private sector's representatives to discuss and exchange experiences on issues of common interest related to money laundering and terrorist financing.
