Bank Refah Kargaran 2020
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Bank Refah Kargaran Anti-Money Laundering (AML) & Combating the Financing of Terrorism (CFT) Policies and Procedures Last updated in 2020 AML & CFT Policies and Procedures of Bank Refah Kargaran Introduction Nowadays, the crime of money laundering and terrorism financing are considered as one of the difficulties and at the same time the most concealed kind of crimes targeting the economy and subsequently the society. This is certainly the underlying reason for countries and international societies for being decisive to fight against the destructive impacts and consequences of this phenomenon while considering its international and organized nature in the current era. Compiling international standards, providing legal infrastructures (relevant rules and regulations) and identifying proper methods to encounter this problem have caused the governance of countries to oppose money laundering and terrorism financing activities along with international authorities through ratifying rules and regulations and implementing them in order to prevent the crime in financial and credit institutions or to present the criminals to judicial authorities in case of occurrence. By approving the law of AML and its executive by-laws, the Islamic Republic of Iran has been also among the countries confronting this indecent phenomenon and has considered money laundering and terrorism financing as a crime and has also prepared necessary rules and regulations which have been approved by the related authorities to prevent these acts. Accordingly, in order to prevent the commitment of such crimes, Anti-Money Laundering & Combating Financing of Terrorism Policies of Bank Refah Kargaran have been ratified and are herewith presented while considering the updated law of AML under number 347/95820 dated 23/01/2019 approved by the Islamic Consultative Assembly and the law of CFT number 15/90661 dated 12/03/2016 approved by the Islamic Consultative Assembly while binding to the rules and regulations circulated by the Central bank of Iran and the FIU, latest guidelines of FATF, Basel principles of Banks for International Settlements (BIS) and the Wolfsberg International Group. AML/CFT policies and procedures of Bank Refah Kargaran which are herewith compiled and being presented have the confirmation of the bank’s board members and are as follows: 2 AML & CFT Policies and Procedures of Bank Refah Kargaran 1- Definitions: 1-1- The Law: AML Law approved in 2008 and its amendment in 2019, CFT Law approved in 2019. 1-2- The Council: The high council of AML/CFT mentioned in article 4 of the Law. 1-3- FIU: Financial Intelligence Unit for AML mentioned in article 7 of the Law. 1-4- AML/CFT Unit: AML/CFT unit which is responsible for AML/CFT tasks mentioned in article 37 of the AML by-law for the included people. 1-5- Included People: people mentioned in article 5 and 6 of the Law. 1-6- Client/Customer: includes any person or legal entity, the principal, the lawyer or legal representative of the person who refers to the included people for having deals, financial transactions, conducting finance project or any other economic activities. 1-7- Suspicious Transactions and Operations: includes any kinds of transactions, paying or receiving wealth in cash or electronically which according to observations and references deem to be suspicious. 1-8- Determined threshold: threshold amount applied for holding bids in retail dealings in cash or the equivalent in any other currencies or precious goods which is annually ratified by the ministry board according to article 3, note 1 of the Bids Law. 1-9- High-risk regions: countries and geographical regions in which the occurrence of money laundering and terrorist financing seems to be high. The list is determined and announced by the Council. 1-10- People under Surveillance: the list and specifications of all individuals whose connection to money laundering and terrorism financing has been proved through risk monitoring and the issue is then announced to the included people by the FIU so that counter measures can be made in order to lessen the risk of money laundering and terrorism financing. 1-11- Suspicious people: the list and specifications of all individuals, whose connection to money laundering and terrorism financing has been determined due to suspicion, are announced to the included people by the 3 AML & CFT Policies and Procedures of Bank Refah Kargaran FIU so that counter measures can be made in order to lessen the risk of money laundering and terrorism financing. 1-12- Sanction List: a list including the name of any individuals or legal entities under the UN Security Council resolution number 1267 and its subsequent resolutions and people under I.R.I sanctions list which have been determined according to the UN Security Council resolution number 1373. 1-13- Client Risk: the risk of money laundering and terrorism financing occurrence which is resulting from factors such as social and occupational status, financial status, type and nature of professional activity, history record and mainland of the person. 1-14- Region Risk: the risk of money laundering and terrorism financing occurrence which is resulting from the geographical status in which the working communication takes place. 1-15- Service Risk: the risk of money laundering and terrorism financing occurrence which is resulting from the type or value of service or transaction presented to the client. 2- The structure of AML/CFT Department of Bank Refah Kargaran : Today, the concept of money laundering has got a wide range of multiple functions in a way that it includes all financial revenues derived from illegal activities such as complicated money transfers, disproportion of the customer’s account turnover with the related profession, non-transparency of the real beneficial owner, nested accounts, tax evasion, etc. Due to the expansion of financial dealings and the application of fraudulent tricks in novel technologies by the money launders, the need for smart systems to be applied against financial crimes has been proved to be more than before. At the same time, due to the installation of AML system which has been established based on FIU principles while considering all other obligatory by- laws from supervisory and legal authorities, the AML/CFT department of the bank has experienced a considerable increase in the volume of referred tasks in recent years. In this regard, the structure of the AML/CFT department has been reviewed according to all requirements announced by the outsourced competent authorities and has gone under some changes and subsequently been approved by the Bank’s Board which includes the following: 4 AML & CFT Policies and Procedures of Bank Refah Kargaran The establishment of a unit for monitoring, tracing, reporting, conducting CTR and STR, analyzing and complying the reports, responding to auditors regarding money laundering and terrorism financing, supervising the bank’s customers for identifying suspicious transactions, etc. The establishment of a unit for making AML/CFT policies and expanding AML/CFT projects and updating the policies when the need arises, conducting the bank’s annual project of AML and CFT and controlling the same on monthly basis, etc. 3- Risk Evaluation and adopting risk-based approach : All organizations and entities under article 5 and 6 of the amended law of AML including the banks, are obliged to collect and implement their internal AML/CFT plans while applying risk-based approach and considering the national deed of risk- evaluation. Accordingly, all the bank’s units and related personnel must evaluate and classify the risk when making decisions for extending banking services to customers prior to rendering any banking services and in order to manage and lessen the risk of money laundering and terrorism financing. Risk classification for the subject transactions must be clear, comprehensive and preventive so that according to the performed classification, the released information and its related measures to confront with money laundering and terrorism financing acts, the derived results seem to be logical. To accomplish this, the following criteria must be taken into consideration: Legal entities who are of abnormal economic activity methods or complicated ownership structure, or those whose financial activities are not consistent with and proportionate to their Articles of Association, Politically Exposed Person (PEP), People commuting in high-risk regions, People with conviction records in relation to money-laundering acts or security issues. Therefore, all the bank’s softwares and systems must be designed in a way that extending banking services becomes possible only when all required information for 5 AML & CFT Policies and Procedures of Bank Refah Kargaran risk-evaluations is gathered and registered. Furthermore this procedure must be constantly and mechanically supervised and necessary measures must be made when deviations are observed. 4- National Cooperation and Coordination According to AML/CFT rules and by-laws, relevant organizations are obliged to establish and install AML systems while determining the possibility of access to the information and the related levels of access for each category. Some of the related measures which can be pointed out are establishing a core system for identifying all Iranian individuals through National Organization for Civil Registration, establishing a unique address system for individuals and legal entities by the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology,