Egypt hosted a special event titled “Role of financial intelligence units in combating illicit financial flows”, on the sidelines of the Conference of States Parties to the United Nations Convention against Corruption in Sharm El Sheikh.

Moderated by Counselor Ahmed Saeed Khalil, Chairman of the Board of Trustees of  the Egyptian Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Combating Unit (EMLCU), and in the presnece of Minsiter Hassan Abdel Shafi Ahmed, Chairman of the Administrative Control Authority and president of the Ninth session of the Conference of the States Parties to the United Nations Conventionagainst Corruption, along with many other national and international stakeholders, the session addressed the importance of promoting financial intelligence units to ensure enahnced access to information; foster exchange of experience amongst stakeholders ; and identify advanced methods to detect illicit financial flows. 

Counselor Khalil stressed that the Egyptian Government has taken several methods to combat illicit financial flows in light of fighting money laundering and terrorist financing, adding that the Government has established rigorous surveillance systems to monitor and detect such crimes. 

The session laid out the definition of illicit financial flows and the latest frameworks used to measure these flows as per international standards, with a special focus on the various sources of illicit flows. The discussion further tackled corruption crimes, invoice manipulation, tax evasion, and the role of the  financial intelligence units in curbing these flows with the help of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime experts and financial intelligence units in other countries.