Hany Abou-El-Fotouh speaks at Middle East Anti-Money Laundering Forum in Bahrain

The 2nd Middle East Anti-Money Laundering Forum, which concluded recently in Bahrain, has highlighted the need to ensure that financial institutions pursue more efforts to combat money laundering. Some 60 specialists from the GCC and Middle East countries took part in the three-day event. Hany Abou-El-Fotouh, Head of Compliance of Oman International Bank (OIB) has delivered a presentation at the forum. Addressing the delegates, Abou-El-Fotouh said: we have agreed upon the importance of KYC (Know Your Customer) procedure. it is the due diligence and bank regulation that financial institutions

must perform to identify their customers and ascertain relevant information pertinent to doing financial business with them


He further added: there is a genuine need for automated monitoring on an ongoing basus to detect the unusual transactions and activities. Regulators in several countries have made it mandatory for financial institutions to implement automated transaction monitoring systems. However, this technology does not substitute firsthand customer interaction. He underscored the importance of adequate staffing: Financial institutions must ensure that their compliance units must have the adequate resources to receive, collate and analyze the transactions in a timely manner and file Suspicious Transaction Report to the competent authority. Finally, Abou-El-Fotouh stressed the important role of on-going training on all aspects of money laundering control in order to ensure that all employees remain up to date with new developments in the fight against money laundering and terrorist financing.