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Source: News & Business > News > By Individual Publication > N > The New York Times CD
Terms: "know your customer" "money laundering" (EditSearch)
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The New York Times, March 2, 2000
BODY:
The Clinton administration plans to ask Congress for sweeping new powers to combat money
laundering including the authority to ban financial transactions between United States banks
or brokerage houses and off-shore financial centers, administration officials said today.
Administration officials say that current laws do not provide enough authority to fight money
laundering, the practice of filtering profits from illegal activities through banks to disguise
their origin. Short of having Congress declare emergency sanctions against countries deemed
to be a national security threat, the officials said, they are mostly confined to waving a finger
at nations that tolerate money laundering and urging American banks to be wary of doing
business with such places.
"The issue of money laundering is so prominent and public that it can't be ignored
anymore," a senior official said. "We need to be able to target the root problems without
unnecessarily hindering legitimate economic activity."
The effort to seek new powers is clearly a response to Russia, where financial
mismanagement has been a problem for the Clinton administration and the International
Monetary Fund. Some analysts and members of Congress have complained that widespread
corruption in that country — helped in part by the ease of transferring funds abroad —
undermined multibillion-dollar foreign aid programs and left one of the administration's top
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