(Vatican Radio) The Financial Intelligence Authority of the Holy See and the Vatican City State – Autorità di Informazione Finanziaria or AIF for short – gave a briefing to journalists on Friday at the Press Office of the Holy See to present the annual report for 2014.
Below, please find the full text of their communiqué in English
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Supervisory framework and international cooperation System further strengthened
The Autorità di Informazione Finanziaria (AIF) of the Holy See and the Vatican City State has presented its Annual Report for 2014. The report reviews the activities and statistics of the AIF for the year 2014.
2014 has seen a continuous strengthening of the legal and institutional framework of the Holy See and the Vatican City State to regulate supervised entities, fostering international cooperation of the Vatican competent authority with its foreign counterparts and to consolidate the prevention and countering of potential illicit financial activities.
“With the introduction of Regulation No. 1, we have completed the prudential supervisory framework of the Holy See and Vatican City State,” said René Brülhart, President of AIF. “By signing Memoranda of Understandings (MOUs) with other Financial Intelligence Units of 13 countries, including Australia, France and the UK as well as with the Regulators of Germany, Luxembourg and the United States of America, we have also massively strengthened international cooperation.”
The reporting system has been consolidated after having received 6 suspicious transaction reports (STR) in 2012, 202 in 2013 and 147 in 2014. Such development is a consequence both of the full implementation of the legal framework and of the substantial improvement in the operational performance of the supervised entities with regard to the prevention of financial crime. 7 reports have been passed on to the Vatican Promoter of Justice for further investigation by judicial authorities. The number of cases of bilateral cooperation between AIF and foreign competent authorities has increased from 4 in 2012 to 81 in 2013 and 113 in 2014. “This continuous increase is a result of the systematic efforts undertaken by AIF as well as the strong commitment of the Holy See and the Vatican City State to cooperate actively with other jurisdictions to prevent and combat potential illicit financial activities globally,” said Tommaso di Ruzza, Director of AIF.
Since 2012, the number of declarations of outgoing cash above the amount of EUR 10,000 has steadily decreased from 1,782 (2012) to 1,557 (2013) and 1,111 in 2014. Declarations for incoming cash have also decreased from 598 (2012) to 550 (2013) and 429 in 2014. This is due to an increased monitoring by the competent authorities and the introduction of reinforced procedures at the supervised entities.
In the initial trimester of 2014, AIF conducted the first ordinary on-site inspection of the IOR to verify the implementation of the measures taken to prevent and counter money laundering and the financing of terrorism pursuant to Law No. XVIII of 8 October 2013. “The first on-site inspection of the IOR is an important consequence and a concrete sign of the effectiveness of the AML/CFT system adopted by the Holy See and the Vatican City State”, said Tommaso Di Ruzza. “To follow closely the implementation of and compliance with the new prudential regulatory framework by the supervised entities will be one of the key tasks of AIF in the near future”.
The inspection has shown no fundamental shortcomings at the IOR. As a result of the inspection, AIF has developed an action plan for the full and systematic adjustment of existing procedures to the required standards in accordance with Law No. XVIII.
About AIF
The Financial Intelligence Authority is the competent authority of the Holy See and the Vatican City State for supervision and financial intelligence for the prevention and countering of money-laundering and financing of terrorism.
Established by Pope Benedict XVI with the Apostolic Letter in form of Motu Proprio of 30 December 2010, AIF carries out its institutional activity according to the Statute adopted by Pope Francis on 15 November 2013 and to Vatican City State Law No. XVIII, of 8 October 2013, on transparency, supervision and financial intelligence .
In 2014, AIF signed MOUs with Argentina, Australia, Cyprus, France, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Malta, Monaco, Peru, Poland, United Kingdom, Romania, San Marino and Switzerland. In previous years, AIF had already signed MOUs with Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Slovenia, Spain and the United States of America. AIF is a member of the Egmont Group since 2013.
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) The Financial Intelligence Authority of the Holy See and the Vatican City State – Autorità di Informazione Finanziaria or AIF for short – gave a briefing to journalists on Friday at the Press Office of the Holy See to present the annual report for 2014. Below, please find the full text of their…
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(Vatican Radio) Details of Pope Francis’ forthcoming visit to Sarajevo on Saturday June 6th were released by the Vatican press office on Thursday. The one day visit, focused on the themes of peace and reconciliation, comes 18 years after Pope John Paul II visited the capital of Bosnia-Herzegovina that had recently emerged from the longest siege in the history of modern warfare.
Philippa Hitchen reports:
‘Peace be with you’ is the motto for this 8th pastoral visit of Pope Francis, encapsulated in the logo depicting a dove with an olive branch in its beak. It’s a poignant theme for the people of Bosnia-Herzegovina, still trying to recover from the devastating three year war which followed the break-up of the former Yugoslavia in the early 1990s.
The country of just under four million people is divided into the majority Bosnian Muslim community, or Bosniaks, who number about 40 percent. They’re followed by a sizeable Serbian, mainly Orthodox, population and a smaller group of largely Catholic Croats, comprising about 15 percent of the nation’s inhabitants.
Around two million people, or half the population, fled from their homes during the war that was brought to an end by a peace deal, signed in Dayton, Ohio. That agreement set up a Bosniak-Croat Federation and a separate Bosnian Serb Republic, under a central government with rotating presidency. Overseeing the fragile peace is an international administration that was backed first by NATO forces and later by a European Union-led peacekeeping force.
On June 6th, the Croat member of the three-man presidency will welcome Pope Francis at the airport in Sarajevo at 9am and accompany him to the presidential palace for a private meeting. After that he will give an address to the civil authorities and diplomatic corps before travelling to the city’s Olympic stadium to celebrate Mass.
After a private lunch with the six bishops of Bosnia-Herzegovina, the Pope will meet with local priests, religious and seminarians in the Catholic cathedral, before travelling to a nearby Franciscan student centre for an ecumenical and interfaith encounter with leaders of the local Muslim, Jewish and Orthodox communities.
Pope Francis’ final stop in Sarajevo will be at a youth centre dedicated to Pope St John Paul II, where he’ll hear firsthand about the many challenges facing young people in the country which has one of the highest unemployment rates in Europe today. The papal place is scheduled to leave Sarajevo at 8pm and arrive back in Rome at around 9.20 on Saturday evening.
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Details of Pope Francis’ forthcoming visit to Sarajevo on Saturday June 6th were released by the Vatican press office on Thursday. The one day visit, focused on the themes of peace and reconciliation, comes 18 years after Pope John Paul II visited the capital of Bosnia-Herzegovina that had recently emerged from the longest…
Read more
(Vatican Radio) “Good communication is always a human rather than a technical achievement.” That was at the heart of an address given by the Secretary of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, Monsignor Paul Tighe, on Wednesday to the World Summit on the Information Society, during their 2015 session for High-Level Policy Statements, which is currently underway in Geneva, Switzerland.
Speaking to Vatican Radio following his speech, Monsignor Tighe said he wanted to stress that, it was important to avoid the presumption that “just because the technologies are there we are going to have a better sense of the unity of the human family or that solidarity and development are automatically going to happen.” He said that what he wanted to underline was the view taken by Pope Francis that, “ultimately, at heart is good communications and good communications is always a human rather than a technical achievement.”
Listen to Lydia O’Kane’s interview with Monsignor Paul Tighe
Asked whether he thought that people should be thinking in terms of “responsible communications”, he said, the term was appropriate because he added , “I would be nervous if people thought that technology alone could achieve the goods that we want to achieve. It’s going to require responsible determination and choices by individuals.”
Looking to the future and addressing how the Vatican media and its multimedia platform can be at the forefront of “good communications”, the Council Secretary said, that “we need to make sure that we’re able to present our teachings our ideas, our perspectives in ways that are going to properly be present in a very different kind of environment. So, I think the challenge for us is always about trying to find ways of being able to speak about our core values…”
He also said that, “we are lucky in the Vatican to have so many very strong well prepared very highly motivated professional communicators and technicians”, I think it’s to ensure that we can find a way that we can all work together to be ever more powerfully the voice and the presence of the Church in the emerging digital arenas.”
World Summit on the Information Society continues through to May 29 th .
(from Vatican Radio)…