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.