# data[].attributes.body
Please fill in this survey at the end of the webinar to give us an understanding of your experiences.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Web survey powered by SurveyMonkey.com. Create your own online survey now with SurveyMonkey's expert certified FREE templates.

# data[].attributes.headline
Session 3: Lawyers as Professional Enablers of IFFs

# data[].attributes.subject
Session 3: Lawyers as Professional Enablers of IFFs

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Session 3. Lawyers as professional enablers of IFFs

# data[].attributes.body
Waridah is a data analyst and researcher at the Committee on Fiscal Studies. Her research work focuses on IFFs, debt/aid, technology and human rights. You can connect with her through her webpage or LinkedIn

Website: Waridah

# data[].attributes.body
Day 1
2-2:45pm facilitated by Waridah Makena
3-3:20pm facilitated by Lyla Latif

Day 2 - facilitated by Lyla Latif

# data[].attributes.body
Lyla Latif, Chair of the Committee on Fiscal Studies

You can read about Lyla's background and experiences on her LinkedIn profile and catch up with her on twitter.

Lyla's research is focused on the physical and digital aspects of revenue generation, its allocation and spending towards social needs. Related to this, she also considers the doctrine based, institutionalised and illicit pathways through which revenue leaks, profits are shifted and lost.

# data[].attributes.body
M Collin (2019) Illicit Financial Flows: Concepts, Measurement and Evidence, The World Bank Observer, Volume 35, Issue 1, p44-86

UNODC (2020) Conceptual Framework for the Statistical Measurement of Illicit Financial Flows

SDG Pulse (2021)

W Fitzgibbon and B Hallman (2020) What is a tax haven? Offshore finance, explained (ICIJ)

N Lord (2018) Managing Illicit Finances Using Corporate Vehicles: PaCCs Policy Briefing

UNICRI (2019) Drivers of Illicit Financial Flows

H Miller and T Pope (2016) Corporate tax avoidance: tackling Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (Institute for Fiscal Studies)

P Carter (2017) Why do Development Finance Institutions use offshore financial centres? (Overseas Development Institute)

L A Latif (2021) Intensifying the Fight Against Corruption and Money Laundering (United Nations)

# data[].attributes.body
A mining corporation bribes a government officer to secure an exploration mining licence. The government officer has an offshore account to which the bribe is deposited. The offshore account is in the name of the company owned by the official’s son. His lawyer then sets up a local investment company in the name of the official’s wife and drafts an investment agreement between the two companies. The bribe money is then transferred from the offshore account usually in a tax haven to the local company with which to invest in purchasing of real estate. Properties are then bought with the received funds and immediately sold. The funds so received create an illusion of legitimacy. Sometimes these funds are used to set up furniture shops in informal sectors where cash is the preferred method or to set up hawala brokers. False receipts are then used to inflate prices with which to cover the proceeds of corruption. This example shows how the informal sector can be used to hide the source of illicit earnings.

Is this scenario indicative of a form of IFF? Which one?

Identify the enablers and drivers of illicit finance from the extract above

Identify all the legal acts, what makes them legal?

Identify all the illegal acts, what makes them illegal?

What recommendations can you make to protect the legal and financial system from facilitating illicit finance?

ⓒLylaLatif, 2022

# data[].attributes.body
A drug trafficker sets up a real estate company in the name of his wife. He makes several deposits over the next few months into the company bank account. The deposit amounts are under US$10,000 so that questions do not arise. He then sets up another foreign company in the name of his relative who resides in the foreign country and transfers cash through Western Union or mobile money over the course of a few months. Through this process, the drug trafficker has placed the illegal funds into two countries financial institutions. The next stage would involve layering. The same drug trafficker then uses his wife’s company to provide ‘loans’ to his relative in a foreign country under a loan agreement drafted by his lawyer between the two companies. His relative receives the bank transfer and uses the money to import cars. He then sells the car for cash and inflates their price on receipts. He then banks the inflated purchase price which comprises the illegal money he has been receiving through mobile transfers or Western Union. The money in the bank is then used to pay the alleged loan given at a high interest rate to the company owned by the drug trafficker’s wife. The loan agreement disguises the illicit origin of the funds. This process goes on over the years. Finally, the drug trafficker then uses his wife’s company to purchase commercial properties which he rents out and collects payment in cash. He keeps a record of false receipts showing higher rents that are then banked. This scheme gives the appearance of legitimacy to the money being earned through his wife’s company.

Is this scenario indicative of a form of IFF? Which one?

Identify all the legal acts, what makes them legal?

Identify all the illegal acts, what makes them illegal?

What recommendations can you make to protect the legal and financial system from facilitating illicit finance?

ⓒLylaLatif, 2022

# data[].attributes.body
“There are armies of bankers, lawyers and accountants who ensure that even though the letter of the law is respected, increasingly immoral ways are found of perverting the spirit of the law to ensure that tax is avoided. To hide its true purpose, the tax avoidance industry adopts the language of real business, so technical innovation and reinventing your business model do not mean finding new products, services and markets, and new ways of supplying them. No, they mean registering your business in a tax haven and becoming a non dom to avoid tax while still enjoying the, admittedly decreasing, benefits and services which make this country the civilised place that it is.”

Hansard, House of Lords Debates, 17 March 2011, col. 375

1.     Can you think of examples of how these “armies of bankers, lawyers and accountants” utilise law and legal institutions to help their clients avoid tax?

2.     What is a tax haven? How do tax havens operate?

3.     Do tax havens still exist post OECD BEPS policy recommendations on and national laws on implementing beneficial ownership registers and sharing cross-border financial information?

4.     What is a non dom status and how does it permit the non dom resident to avoid tax?

ⓒLylaLatif, 2022

# data[].attributes.body
Webinar: Professional Enablers of IFFs: An Introduction to IFFs and the Role of Lawyers

Time:
Aug 17, 2022 2:00 PM
Aug 18, 2022 2:00 PM

Join Zoom Meeting
https://cardiff.zoom.us/j/83220316007?pwd=THBFTFFZWnkvUUFJbUZHeXJUYkNjQT09

Meeting ID: 832 2031 6007
Password: 245659

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Zoom is the leader in modern enterprise video communications, with an easy, reliable cloud platform for video and audio conferencing, chat, and webinars across mobile, desktop, and room systems. Zoom Rooms is the original software-based conference room solution used around the world in board, conference, huddle, and training rooms, as well as executive offices and classrooms. Founded in 2011, Zoom helps businesses and organizations bring their teams together in a frictionless environment to get more done.