Head of Qatar Financial Information Unit, Sheikh Ahmed Al Thani (second left); Chair of the Egmont Group of Financial Intelligence Units and Director of the Financial Intelligence Centre of South Africa, Xolisile Khanyile (left); Executive Secretary of the Egmont Group, Jerome Beaumont (second right); and Chief Financial Crime Compliance and Governance at QNB, Riadh Al Fayech during the panel discussion.
The Qatar Financial Information Unit (QFIU) headed by Sheikh Ahmed Al Thani hosted a panel discussion on Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) to fight financial crime yesterday at the Ned Hotel, Doha. The discussion was held in view of its national prominent role to combat money laundering and terrorism financing, a major issue affecting the world today.
The event, which gathered over 100 participants from both the public and private sectors, was graced by the presence of the Chair of the Egmont Group of Financial Intelligence Units and Director of the Financial Intelligence Centre of South Africa, Xolisile Khanyile and the Executive Secretary of the Egmont Group, Jerome Beaumont.
The discussion was aimed at strengthening PPPs against financial crime and provide a forum for the Anti-Money Laundering / Countering the Financing of Terrorism (AML/CFT) stakeholders and the representatives from QFIU, the supervisory authorities and the private sector to discuss and share experiences on matters of common concern involving money laundering and terrorism financing, namely, in terms of examining the links between the public and private sectors in terms of accessing FININT to protect the domestic and global economy and financial system, identifying the good practices and challenges in the area of sharing information between the two sectors and proposing measures to develop effective PPPs.
H E Sheikh Ahmed Al Thani, Head of Qatar Financial Information Unit presented the QFIU experience in PPPs, stressing the importance of the partnership in strengthening the combating system.
Chair of the Egmont Group of Financial Intelligence Units and Director of the Financial Intelligence Centre of South Africa Xolisile Khanyile shared South Africa’s experience in PPP “SAMLIT”, while the Executive Secretary of the Egmont Group Jerome Beaumont highlighted the PPPs in international standards from the Egmont Group perspective.
Chief Financial Crime Compliance and Governance at Qatar National Bank (QNB) Riadh Al Fayech discussed the PPP benefit and risk from the private sector perspective.
Director of the Financial Crime Compliance Department at Qatar Central Bank (QCB) Salem Al Kuwari also underlined QCB’s keenness to promote and maintain effective cooperation between the public and private sectors and ensure the implementation by the financial institutions of QCB’s instructions to improve the reporting process and submit high quality Suspicious Transactions Reports (STRs) to QFIU.
At the conclusion of the discussion QFIU commended the active participation and interaction of the attendees and the continued and joint constructive cooperation in the support of the national anti-money laundering and terrorism financing system; and will prepare a summary report of the panel discussion and distribute it amongst the participants.
