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Liberia, Sierra Leone FIUs Dialogue on Increasing Intelligence Gathering, Intelligence Sharing, and Public Awareness

The two neighboring countries, Liberia and Sierra Leone who are members of the Mano River Union (MRU), have jointly agreed to collaborate and work together regarding gathering and sharing intelligence and implementing maximum public awareness via the media for the promotion of the fight against money laundering and countering terrorist financing.

The both countries reached and signed a communique recently, when Liberia Financial Intelligence Unit along with other competent authorities in Liberia’s Anti-Money Laundering and Countering Terrorist Financing regime concluded a week-long visit to Freetown, Sierra Leone.

Both Director Generals of the Sierra Leonean and Liberian FIUs, David N. Borbor and Edwin W. Harris, talked about lessons learned and shared experiences about proper preparation for full readiness, as the Inter-Governmental Action Against Money laundering in West Africa (GIABA) is expected to conduct the second round of mutual evaluation for Liberia early next year (2022).

However, the approved 2021 joint communique of the two MRU countries highlights several issues for future cooperation, lessons learned and objectives of the exchange visit:

  • Develop joint proposal for funding under the OSIWA’s Economic Justice Programme and other Cross–cutting initiatives to address common challenges relating to cross border illicit activities.
  • Enhance bilateral intelligence gathering and sharing to address effectiveness in the AML/CFT Regimes of the two countries.
  • Both institutions will strengthen the relationship and expand the cooperation to other Mano-River Union countries, including the Republics of Guinea and Ivory Coast. 
  • Work on a typology study focusing on cross–border trade-based money laundering and terrorist financing. 
  • Sierra Leone FIU will lead a delegation for the purpose of conducting a weeklong exchange/ study visit to the Republic of Liberia.
  • Continuous visits and partnership to build on, strengthen and expand on the existing bilateral cooperation in areas of common interest.

A. Lessons Learned during the Exchange/Study Visit

The Liberian FIU delegation has benefited immensely from the exchange/ study visit based on several high-level interactions with policy makers, competent authorities, private sector actors and the media.

Therefore, the lessons learned from the visit are:

  • FIU’s pivotal role in the coordination of all processes and procedures leading to Liberia’s preparedness of its Mutual Evaluation Process. 
  • Liberia FIU plays a critical role during the Mutual Evaluation Process which constitutes the coordination of the activities of all relevant stakeholders of the process and sourcing of information required by the GIABA assessment team. 
  • Increased engagement of the media is vital to ensuring public awareness about the process, as well as developing public interest. 
  • The understanding of Liberia National Risk Assessment (NRA) Report by all stakeholders is relevant to the process as it demonstrates the extent to which a country has identified, assessed, and understood the risks of money laundering and terrorist financing that will inform the extent of mitigating measures required. 
  • That the maintenance and accessibility of statistical records and other data is vital to demonstrating the extent of effectiveness of a country’s AML/CFT regime. 
  • That at every stage in the Mutual Evaluation Process, a country has opportunity to provide additional information, seek clarification from the assessment team on the process, have face-to-face discussions with the assessment team and challenge the contents of the report based on facts on the ground. 
  • That the will to fight Financial Crimes begins with heads of the three branches of government, including key policy makers, adequate financial support to competent authorities, the courage of the technicians/experts to do their job and the express support of the people in fighting financial crimes. 
  • The participation of a country in the process is a demonstration of its commitment to fight money laundering, terrorist financing and goodwill support provided by the government of the assessed country.
  • And the common challenge faced by both countries is enhancing the effectiveness of the AML/CFT regime, including inadequate supervision of the DNFBP sector, low rate of investigation and prosecution of ML and TF, the existence of many porous borders and timely access to information. 
  • “The Liberia FIU delegation will use knowledge gained from the lessons learned to enhance their State of Preparedness for the Mutual Evaluation Process of the Republic of Liberia,” the communique noted.

B. Objectives of Exchange /Study Visit  

In line with the existing bilateral MOU between Liberia FIU and Sierra Leone FIU, the objectives of the visit highlights issues such as:

  • Enhance the capacity of Liberia Competent authorities in coordinating their forthcoming mutual evaluation in March 2022. 
  • Understand the operations of FIU Sierra Leone.
  • Create the platform for sharing of experiences and good practices on AML/CFT compliance and related cross-border challenges. 
  • Promote cooperation, collaboration, coordination, and engagement amongst and between the governments and the FIUs of the two countries to effectively implement AML/CFT measures – and 
  • Use the visit as a Launchpad to promote cooperation amongst countries within the Mano River Basin (Guinea, Liberia, Ivory Coast and Sierra Leone).