Financial Institutions: Disrupting Financial Flows of Human Trafficking & Migrant Smuggling, 22-24/03/21

What:  National Training Workshop: Role of Financial Institutions in Detecting, Identifying and Disrupting Illicit Financial Flows of Trafficking in Human Beings and Smuggling of Migrants

Where: Mombasa, Kenya

When: 22 – 24 March 2021

Who: 32 Participants

Participating institutions:

(major financial institutions and regulating agencies of the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) and the Financial Reporting Centre (FRC)

Context:

The fight against money laundering, terrorism financing, human trafficking and migrant smuggling, and other related crimes requires effective engagement of the financial services and other relevant stakeholders. Operational cooperation and coordination between the different public and private institutions is essential to successfully fight human trafficking, migrant smuggling and protecting the integrity of the financial system. Understanding and disrupting the financial flow of criminals through effective Anti Money Laundering measures and financial investigations is vital in disrupting the criminal networks and their financial flows. This Project successfully organised a similar training virtually in September 2019, involving 28 mainly Kenyan banks, the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) and Kenya Bankers Association (KBA). Given the big number of financial institutions in Kenya, this training was limited to banks that did not participate in the previous training

Objectives

The training workshop aimed to sensitise participants on the role of financial institutions in disrupting financial operations of THB/SoM criminal networks through effective AML measures. It also purposed to reinforce the capabilities of banks in detecting, identifying and disrupting illicit financial flows of THB/SoM criminal networks. The training also enhanced the understanding of the key themes covered in the training including:

• The AML/CFT regime of Kenya
• THB/SoM and the counter measures in Kenya
• THB/SoM criminal networks and their financial flows in Kenya and the Greater Horn of Africa region
• THB/SoM related money laundering red flag indicators
• Public Private Partnerships – effective collaboration between financial institutions and regulatory bodies,

The workshop provided various opportunities to participants to share good practices/experiences and challenges among themselves. There was also emphasis on the two regulatory bodies present, the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) and the Financial Reporting Centre (FRC) to further enhance collaboration in the detection, identification and disruption of THB/SoM criminal networks and flow of their finance that will further intensify the fight against money laundering, human trafficking/smuggling and terrorism financing.

Outcomes/Lessons learnt

Among the main relevant outcomes highlighted were:

• Have more case studies whether local or foreign to share experiences;
• Get various facilitators to avoid dominance by few
• Consider extending the training to business and operation officers since there are the front line gatekeepers who interact with customers
• Have more team building sessions with practical case studies to enable participants to get to know each other in a different way to enable easier networking
• Organise Training for senior most top management of FIs together.
• The training was well organised and very well coordinated

For more on this, please see Newsletter 010