The role of professional organisations in a country is as important as that of banks in the drive against money laundering.

Speaking on the malaise of money laundering at a seminar organised by the Dubai Chapter of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India yesterday, Andrew Duff, CEO of Standard Chartered Bank, UAE, passionately called for 'zero tolerance' on money laundering.

"Money laundering has assumed astronomical proportions and current transactions have been estimated - as per the prime economic model - at about $2.58 trillion per annum," Andrew Duff observed.

Citing the IMF report, Abbas Ali Mirza, chairman of the chapter said that the total volume of money laundering was put at about two to five per cent of the world GDP calculated in 1996. Mirza praised the steps being pursued by the UAE government towards curbing this.

UAE, which is part of the 39-strong Financial Action Task Force (FATF) formed by the G7 in 1989, has already set up an action committee to curb money laundering. These member countries are bound by 40 recommendations formulated to check the perpetration of money laundering globally.

According to the circular from UAE Central Bank, any transaction aimed at concealing or changing the identity of the illegally obtained money, amounts to money laundering.

Marius Greyling of Deloitte & Touche, South Africa, through his presentation tried to give an insight into the international compliance programme for combating money laundering. He highlighted the importance of the systems and checks in combating money laundering as well as the need for regular reviews of these systems.

Analysing the steps involved in money laundering, Andrew Duff explained that this is being carried out through three steps - placements, layering and integration. While placements refers to the entry of illegal money into the system, layering is where the involvement of banks come.

And through the process of integration, this money once again finds way back into the system. Marius described the various steps involved in the money laundering through case studies. He also demonstrated a time consuming investigation process which his company has carried out in investigating a money laundering case in Germany.