U.S., Asian nations discuss ways to choke terrorist funding
U.S., Asian nations discuss ways to choke terrorist funding
Agencies, Singapore
Officials from more than 20 countries including the United States began a closed-door regional meeting in Singapore on Tuesday to discuss ways of choking off funding to terrorist groups.
The workshop drew representatives from foreign ministries, law enforcement agencies and the financial regulatory bodies of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF).
The U.S. and Singapore governments are co-hosting the two-day meeting.
"The purpose of the workshop is to promote international cooperation in combating terrorist financing by providing an opportunity for ASEAN and PIF officials to exchange views on our national experiences and strengthen our individual and collective capacities in counter-terrorism finance," Singapore's foreign ministry said in a statement.
Participants will discuss compliance with a UN Security Council resolution providing a common legal basis for international action against terrorists and their supporters, and other initiatives to curb terrorist financing.
Global cooperation against terrorism grew after the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States, said Raymond Lim, Singapore's minister of state for foreign affairs.
Before the attacks, only four nations were parties to the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism. Now a total of 132 nations are signatories, Lim said.
"There is increasing recognition among law enforcement, financial regulatory and intelligence agencies that combating money-laundering and terrorism financing are important ingredients in the fight against terrorism," he said in a speech opening the workshop.
"The globalised nature of the international financial system, which has served as an engine for unprecedented economic growth in many countries, has made the transfer of funds across borders a seamless task," Lim said.
The efficiency of the financial system has been abused by terrorists and the challenge for governments is how to prevent this while ensuring that the system works smoothly and legitimate transactions are not unnecessarily disrupted, he added.
Lim pointed out differences between terrorist financing and money-laundering by criminal syndicates -- the sums moved by terrorists can be smaller and more difficult to detect, and often involve "clean money" from ostensibly legitimate businesses or charities.
In a similar meeting last month on the Indonesian resort of Bali, which was shaken last October by a terrorist bombing that left more than 190 people dead, officials gave a picture of the scale of money-laundering -- and the relatively small amounts needed by militant groups to finance their operations.
Australian Justice Minister Chris Ellison said that money- laundering worldwide was estimated to be worth between 800 billion and two trillion dollars a year, or 2.5 percent of the world's gross domestic product.
Indonesian Foreign Minister Hassan Wirayuda said that a relatively small sum -- 30,000 dollars in the case of the Bali bombing -- could be used "to destroy a huge amount of business assets and opportunities."
Singapore, Southeast Asia's financial capital, has ratified the convention on suppressing terrorism finance, and will undertake an assessment of its anti-money laundering and counter- terrorist financing regime in the middle of this year.
Meanwhile, experts at a maritime security conference warned on Tuesday that terrorists could use commercial ships to ram targets much the way hijackers used commercial airplanes to destroy New York's World Trade Center,
Driving ships into targets is a "real eventuality," said Noel Cunningham, head of security and port operations for Los Angeles. He added that port officials must look out for terrorists among ship crews, as well as bombs or weapons of mass destruction hidden in cargo containers.
"The war on terrorism has moved from battlefields on foreign soil to the ports," Cunningham told delegates to the International Maritime and Port Security Conference in Singapore. "You cannot let your guard down."
About 400 people attended the opening session of the three-day conference.