Mar.09, 2010, 21:11 GMT

An international legal practitioner, Mr John Hardy, has emphasised the need for countries all over the world to co-operate in their fight against money laundering.

He said “Because money laundering is an international activity, it can only be restrained and restricted if anti-money laundering is conducted on the basis of international standards, is internationally monitored, and international co-operation measures which are (employed) so as to work expeditiously without bureaucratic hindrance, are put in place.”

According to him, one major difficulty confronting the translation of international declarations of principles and intent into effective domestic legislation is the tension between the need to promote transparency in banking transactions on one hand and the other hand the principle of client confidentiality which binds all banks and banking practice.

Mr Hardy was speaking at a public lecture on money laundering organised by the Danquah Institute in collaboration with the Faculty of Law of the University of Ghana.

He said banking by its nature is shrouded in secrecy and confidentiality.

In order to promote effective anti-money laundering, he argued, banks must change their culture and modus operandi.

Quoting recommendations on combating money laundering, Mr Hardy said, “money laundering methods and techniques change in response to developing counter measures.”

He added that with criminal activities, “as methods of detection evolve, so too, do techniques of avoidance.”

What is important, he noted is that the more uniform those methods of detection become, and the more universally they are applied, the more they stand a realistic prospect of success.

He said one other effective way of fighting money laundering is actively involving the citizenry.

Citizens, he argued must report suspicious transactions.