Day: March 5, 2024

More on the Martinelli saga. With the ex-President now formally banned from taking part in the May election (even if he were not hiding in the Nicaraguan Embassy), the next question raised is if his replacement can run for President if he was not chosen in a primary? It seems it took 10 hours for the magistrates of the Tribunal Electoral before announcing Martinelli’s disqualification and the recognition of Mulino as a Presidential candidate.

Apart from the above, the Tribunal Electoral says that it is is processing 22 requests for the lifting of electoral criminal immunity affecting 17 other people who are standing in the elections in May.

La Prensa helpfully explains that…”According to Article 305 of the Electoral Code, the electoral criminal jurisdiction is the right of the presidents, vice-presidents, secretaries and deputy secretaries-general of legally constituted parties, candidates, electoral delegates, electoral bodies of political parties, members of electoral corporations, electoral officials and liaisons not to be investigated, detained, arrested or prosecuted in matters criminal, police or administrative, provided that the latter involve the imposition of a custodial sentence, without the express prior authorization of the electoral administrative courts, except in the case of flagrante delicto“.

5 MARCH 2024

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On 5 March, the SRA reported that it had revised and updated its AML Sectoral Risk Assessment, and that firms regulated by it will need to take this into account when assessing their own level of risk.  The updated document draws attention to the following new risks:

• vendor fraud;
• pooled client funds;
• third-party managed accounts; and
• irregular methods of transferring funds.

Other changes include reference to the risk of modern slavery in relation to cash-based industries.

https://www.sra.org.uk/sra/research-publications/aml-risk-assessment

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On 5 March, Art Forum reported that Guy Wildenstein, patriarch of the powerful Wildenstein dynasty, had been found guilty of tax fraud and money laundering in Paris.  He was sentenced to 4 years in prison, with half the sentence suspended, and the other half as home detention, wearing an ankle monitor.   He also received a €1 million fine, had more than €3.4 million of his personal assets seized, and was ordered to pay the French Government all back taxes owed.  Other members of the family, notary, a lawyer, and 2 trust-fund managers have also convicted on connected charges.

https://www.artforum.com/news/french-american-art-dealer-guy-wildenstein-convicted-tax-fraud-550450

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On 5 March, CSIS reported that the 13^th WTO Ministerial Conference had resolved that the moratorium is now scheduled to expire on 31 March 2026, or at the 14^th ministerial conference, whichever comes first.  It is said that India, South Africa, and Indonesia opposed an extension primarily because they want the money the taxes would bring in to their treasuries.

https://www.csis.org/analysis/fish-are-not-amused

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On 5 March, a Notice from HM Treasury advised that Igor Viktorovich MAKAROV had been removed from its sanctions lists.

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/65e6f2233f69457ff103608f/Notice_Russia_050324.pdf

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On 5 March, OFAC advised that Angel RONDON RIJO, a Dominican Republic national had been removed from the sanctions lists.

https://ofac.treasury.gov/recent-actions/20240305

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On 5 March, OFAC advised that it had designated 2 individuals and 5 entities associated with the Intellexa Consortium for their role in developing, operating, and distributing commercial spyware technology used to target Americans, including US Government officials, journalists, and policy experts.  It says that since its founding in 2019, the Intellexa Consortium has acted as a marketing label for a variety of offensive cyber companies that offer commercial spyware and surveillance tools to enable targeted and mass surveillance campaigns.  These tools are packaged as a suite of tools under the brand-name “Predator” spyware, which can infiltrate a range of electronic devices through zero-click attacks that require no user interaction for the spyware to infect the device.  Once a device is infected by the Predator spyware, the spyware can be leveraged for a variety of information stealing and surveillance capabilities — this includes the unauthorized extraction of data, geolocation tracking, and access to a variety of applications and personal information on the compromised device.  The entities are Greek, Irish, Hungarian and North Macedonian.

https://ofac.treasury.gov/recent-actions/20240305

https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy2155

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The Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office has published this report which provides a summary and a preliminary assessment of the provisions and implementation of the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018. 

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/65e16ea23f6945001d03603d/Post_Legislative_Scrutiny_Memorandum_Sanctions_and_Anti-Money_Laundering_Act_2018.pdf

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