Azerbaijan: Change for the better. Oh and a Happy Christmas to you all!

Image via Wikipedia

You may recall that, on 12 December, 2008, The Council of Europe AML specialists (MONEYVAL) called "on its member states and other countries to advise their financial institutions to pay special attention by applying enhanced due diligence to transactions with persons and financial institutions from or in Azerbaijan in order to address the ML/FT risks*.

On the 14th December 2009, MONEYVAL stated that Azerbaijan has been upgraded its AML and CFT programmes. It did this by withdrawing it’s advice to pay special attention to transactions emanating from or in anyway involving passing through the country.

Here is a link with slightly more detail: http://www.coe.int/t/dghl/monitoring/moneyval/About/AZE_StatDec09_en.pdf

Well I'm travelling off on my first vist to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to tutor a week long AML course so I'll be travelling over Christmas itself.

So let me wish all you readers and contributors a very Merry Christmas (or Season's Greetings according to your faith)and a Prosperous New Year!