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Dubai:

United Arab Emirates, which remains a cash-based society and is considered an important regional financial center for the Gulf region, because of its role as the primary transportation and trading hub for the Gulf states, East Africa, and South Asia, and with expanding trade ties with the countries of the former Soviet Union, it is regarded as having the potential to be a major center for money laundering. Money laundering may take place within the formal banking system, including the numerous money exchange houses, but is believed to be largely confined to the informal and largely undocumented "hawala" remittance system – an undocumented and nontransparent system. The UAE government also has admitted the need to better regulate "near-cash" items such as gold, jewelry, and gemstones, especially in the burgeoning markets in Dubai. UAE acceded to the Kimberley Process in November 2002 and began certifying rough diamonds exported from there on Jan. 1, 2003. UAE customs officials may delay or even confiscate diamonds entering UAE from a KP member nation without the proper KP certificate.

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The evidence at trial also showed that HOMA's principal business was transferring funds from third parties to accounts and individuals around the world, particularly in Iran. During the time GAVIDEL was operating HOMA, there was an embargo against trade with Iran, prohibiting all exports to Iran, including the financial services that GAVIDEL and HOMA provided. As the evidence at trial showed, GAVIDEL disguised his transfers of funds to Iran by sending them in bulk through third parties, principally a broker based in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. In total, between mid-1998 and 2000, GAVIDEL illegally transferred approximately $2 million to Iran through Dubai. Proof at trial of this offense included extensive accounting records maintained by GAVIDEL of his illegal transfers to Iran, as well as numerous intercepted faxes from accomplices in Iran and Dubai confirming the receipt and deposit of funds in Iran. Trial evidence also showed that, when questioned by the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control ("OFAC") about HOMA transactions destined for Iran, GAVIDEL falsely stated that, "at no point had business relations or the transfer of funds between [HOMA] and Iran existed" and described HOMA's business as merely an "importer, exporter and trader of various products in the Middle East and Far East."

Following GAVIDEL's conviction, he was remanded to the custody of the U.S. Marshals Service.

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Top Money Laundering Experts For Dubai Banking Summit

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Colourful ex-felon on speakers’ list

DUBAI - Money laundering, a scourge of the world’s financial and law-enforcement sectors, will be under the microscope in Dubai in April at a global banking strategy summit, Channels, and one of the visiting speakers will know all about having a captive audience.

Among a host of elite speakers flying in from Europe, Asia, the Far East, Australia and South Africa for ‘Channels 2004’ from April 25-28 will be Humberto Aguilar, a one-time criminal defence lawyer- turned criminal himself, and now an anti-money laundering expert.

Miami-based Aguilar is clearly a case of ‘set a thief to catch a thief’. Aguilar certainly boasts first-hand experience, having been convicted in the US in 1990 for helping his clients defraud the Internal Revenue Service by hiding their illegally obtained funds in foreign bank accounts and for having participated in sharing revenues from drug importation conspiracy.

His professional duties these days include lecturing for Money Laundering Alert in Miami, Puerto Rico and Panama, a monthly column for Money Laundering Bulletin and writing for Offshore Financial Intermediary.

Aguilar also says he has been drafted in by the US Government to aid in the War on Terror.

“I have been retained by the US Department of Homeland Security’s Bureau of Immigration and Customs Security to help thwart terrorism financing through money laundering activities.”

Aguilar says he is looking forward to his Dubai visit where he will join more than 50 experts of international standing in the global financial sector who will take the stage at the Channels strategy forum over the four days as either speakers or panelists.

Venue is the Crowne Plaza Hotel, where the exhibition for top-tier players in the financial service industry has been sold out for months due to regional executives being ultra-keen to hear the speakers and panel discussions.

Among globalisation, profitability and technology subjects to be featured at Channels are multi-channel delivery strategies, bancassurance, branding, product innovations and Islamic finance.

“Channels will be the banking industry’s biggest event in Dubai this year. It will be a unique forum that won’t be afraid to deal with the thorniest issues,” says event organiser Cordelia Henry, Conference Director for IIR.

Experts in the globalisation field will deal in depth with the Gulf States and the WTO, cross-border banking as well as mergers and acquisitions.

Another high-profile speaker is Joseph DiVanna, author of six books, whose lively subject will be “Everything You Wanted To Know About Retail Banking in 30 Minutes.”

Channels will be held against a series of significant developments in the economic mechanisms of the Gulf region. A number of Gulf states, notably Bahrain and the UAE, have embarked on pushes to be major international financial players.