FLASH
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Law enforcement officials involved in money laundering...
Albania continues to be a hotbed for money laundering. The State Department has raised the alarm in every report, and the area where the most dirty money is being dumped is construction.
The Financial Intelligence Agency has published its annual report for the past year, indicating that it has identified 234 cases of money laundering.
" It is worth noting that the largest share of cases sent by the AIF were addressed to the DPPSH, as the main law enforcement body in the country and specialized in carrying out investigative actions. Among the cases sent to the Prosecutor's Office in 2024, the largest share was occupied by those sent to SPAK, which also includes cases sent to the BKH, with 53% of the total and the rest belongs to the Prosecutor's Offices of General Jurisdiction. During 2024, in addition to sending cases to the Prosecutor's Office and the DPPSH, information was also sent to the DPT for 25 cases for which suspicions of tax evasion, income concealment or other violations of tax legislation were concluded. In 2024, the AIF sent 116 pieces of information to the SHISH, regarding cases suspected of criminal activity, a common object of interest between the two institutions ," the report states. The document emphasizes that people accused of corruption are also involved, while a former justice official is also taken as an example.
Further details were provided on the money laundering schemes pursued by people in politics and the criminal world, which have put the body in question into motion:
-Suspicious transfers (incoming or outgoing, even attempted) involving foreign entities, citizens and not justified by supporting documentation;
-Investment in high-value real estate, with unclear, unknown or unjustified source of funds;
-Purchase of luxury movable assets (e.g. high-value vehicles, jewelry, watches, etc.) that do not match the client's financial capacity;
-Transactions by persons suspected of being involved in previous criminal activity or connections to persons with criminal records;
-Conducting fragmented transactions with the intention of avoiding reporting below the established threshold;
-Suspicious increases in the capital of legal entities, with unknown sources of income or with fictitious elements;
-Purchase of shares/quotas of legal entities at a lower or higher price, compared to the value of the company's net capital;
-Sponsorships, donations, loans from/to third parties without apparent connections that could justify transactions between the parties, or transactions with doubts about the source of funds and negative findings for the parties involved;
-Purchase of real estate below market value;
-The use of third parties for transactions and investments, without precedent and obvious criminal connections, in order to conceal the origin of income;
-involvement of the same or related persons in multiple businesses, with the aim of circulating funds, concealing their origin and destination, by carrying out a chain of transactions in several countries;
Money laundering typologies
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