EU States Slow to Implement Money Laundering Laws
June 5, 2008
On Thursday, June 5, the EU executive warned Germany for the second time that it would have to answer to the European Court of Justice if it didn't put the counterfeit laws into effect within the next two months.
Fourteen other EU states, including Luxembourg, Spain, France and the Netherlands, received similar warnings on Thursday.
The law dates from 2005 and the EU said it should have been enforced in mid-December 2007. It stipulates that banks and financial institutions, as well as lawyers, notaries, casinos and any business dealing with more than 15,000 euros ($23,000) in cash, are to report any suspicion of money laundering or terrorism to the authorities.
In the past, the German interior ministry has defended its tardiness in pointing out that the law is particularly complicated and that other EU countries were also slow in implementing it.