Bangladesh Bank governor Ahsan H Mansur said that the Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit, the central bank and other government organisations were working to bring back laundered money by forming an inter-agency taskforce.
The recent surge in remittance inflow through banking channel shows that money laundering is going down, he also observed.
Ahsan H Mansur was speaking as chief guest while inaugurating the two-day CAMLCO Conference 2025 at Radisson Blu Chattogram Bay View on Friday.
The Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit, in association with the Association of Anti Money Laundering Compliance Officers of Banks in Bangladesh, organised the conference.
BFIU head AFM Shahinul Islam presided over the event, said a press release. Association of Bankers, Bangladesh chairman Selim RF Hussain was present as a special guest.
AACOBB chairman Mohammad Ziaul H Molla was present among others.
Chief anti-money laundering compliance officers and deputy chief anti-money laundering compliance officers of all scheduled banks operating in Bangladesh participated in the conference.
The governor mentioned that the recent review has identified the lack of institutional good governance as the main reason for irregularities, corruption and money laundering in the banking sector.
He said that the banks that have been able to ensure institutional good governance are now the pioneers in the country’s banking sector.
Stressing the importance of the autonomy of the central bank, he further said that if it was possible to ensure the real autonomy of the central bank, such a crisis would not have arisen in the country’s banking sector.
AACOBB chairman Mohammad Ziaul H Mollah, expressed his commitment to strengthen AML/CFT compliance fearlessly.
Association of Bankers Bangladesh chairman Selim RF Hossain, in his welcome speech, called for strengthening technology-based monitoring systems to prevent money laundering and terrorist financing, as well as taking effective measures to eliminate deficiencies in institutional good governance.
The event president, BFIU chief AFM Shahinul Islam, in his speech highlighted the negative impact of uncontrolled credit flow in the banking sector, increase in default rate, loan fraud, lack of corporate governance and the menace of money laundering and hundi on the country’s economic growth, inflation, foreign exchange reserves, balance of payments and other macroeconomic issues.
He further mentioned that the new leadership in various sectors of the economy and various policy and timely initiatives of Bangladesh Bank have already started to have a positive impact on the management of reserves and foreign exchange markets due to the increase in remittance flow.
The conference discussed the role of anti-money laundering measures in preventing corporate abuse and money laundering in overcoming the crisis in the banking sector, new types of money laundering including gold smuggling, illegal hundi, online gaming/betting/forex trading and cryptocurrency transactions, and strategies to prevent them.