Romania Tracks Laundered Money to Foreign Accounts

Romanian authorities started a vast operation, in search for the huge amounts of money illegally obtained and then siphoned out of the country. The first step was to request blocking the bank accounts in Monaco of Romanian politicians and high-flying business people guilty of money laundering. The same action will be pursued for bank accounts in Switzerland, Italy, Cyprus and Andorra.

Ilie Botos, the Prosecutor General, stated at the beginning of this week - in a live television show on Realitatea TV - that a good number of politicians and prominent business people in Romania would not be able to take their money out of the bank accounts they opened abroad.
Botos restated this when Jurnalul National contacted him yesterday. "There are good chances that we would get back the money," said Botos, adding that he could give no other details "to not damage the chances for the investigation to be successful."

Though no official information was available, sources in the Prosecutor’s General Office told Jurnalul National that some bank accounts in Monaco had been blocked. The accounts belong to people investigated for money laundering. The process of tracking and recuperating the laundered money from foreign bank accounts will continue, in view of the recent decision of Prosecutors General from EU member states and candidate countries to cooperate to that end.

Romanian Police sent 147 files on people investigated for corruption to the National Department for Fighting Corruption san independent office recently turned under the umbrella of the Prosecutor’s General Officet.
This is 126% more than in the first eight months last year, stated a press release from the Ministry of Interior yesterday.
The number of investigations succeeding in bringing perpetrators to court doubled, from 354 cases in the first eight months of 2004, to 720 cases in the first eight months of 2005.
Police investigated 4,275 persons on corruption charges, of which 1,209 held managerial positions. Of the people indicted for corruption, 83 were elected in the local and national legislative bodies, 371 were public servants, and 239 were managers of publicly owned companies.