AML / CFT : Indonesia beefs up AML Act
Indonesia has updated its Anti Money Laundering Act - and corruption is first in the firing line.
The Corruption Eradication Committee (KPK) says that it now has the bite to investigate corruption effectively after the House of Representatives amended the Anti Money Laundering Act and included it in the list of entities that the PPATK (the FIU) can include in its notifications of suspicious activity.
“There are a lot of cases of corruption that also contain indications of money laundering,” KPK deputy chairman Bibit Samad Rianto said.
“Previously we only had the authority to investigate the corruption charges, while allegations of money laundering were sent to the National Police.”
But PPATK, which had hoped to transform itself into an intelligence-led investigation agency along the lines of Thailand's Anti Money Laundering Office (AMLO) were rejected. That, says Indonesian Corruption Watch in an interview with The Jakarta Globe, says means that investigation agencies including KPK are not in the strongest possible position.
"Because the PPATK cannot conduct its own investigations, the KPK has to start from scratch when handling a corruption case because the PPATK report has no legal standing in a court of law,” said ICW's chairman Danang Widoyono.
Critics of the position in Indonesia are jealous of AMLO's ability to form the case which is then taken up by other agencies.
However, AMLO is almost unique amongst FIUs: in almost all cases, the FIU collects intelligence not evidence and passes that to the appropriate authorities to build a case.
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