A special year 2022, marked by the Russian offensive in Ukraine: for several months, Tracfin, the French unit for financial intelligence and the fight against money laundering and terrorist financing, has been contributing to the effort to “financial war” against Vladimir Putin’s regime.
Appointed director on January 20, a month before the outbreak of the conflict, Guillaume Valette-Valla took advantage of the release of Tracfin’s annual report on Wednesday July 27 to detail the missions of the department attached to Bercy, which coordinates a “task force” involving the tax administration and customs: identify oligarchs close to the Kremlin who hold assets in France (accounts, villas, etc.), so that they can be placed under European sanctions and have their assets frozen or, if necessary, seized; ensure that these possible supporters of the war do not circumvent the freezing measures on the territory, for example through shell companies or trusts acting on their behalf or that of their family, and concealing their identity.
“Notaries and banks are informed of the freezing measures and are required to declare any attempt to circumvent them, several cases having already been identified”declares to World Guillaume Valette-Valla. In total, as of June 3, 1,158 natural persons and 98 Russian and Belarusian entities have been placed under European sanctions, among which a small number hold assets in France. In France, 1.186 billion euros of assets (financial and non-financial) have been immobilized, including more than 705 million corresponding to more than fifty frozen properties. In this second phase of the management of the Ukrainian crisis, another sensitive project is underway, which consists of identifying possible offenses committed in France by these oligarchs under sanctions. “Any suspicion of money laundering, on French soil, of an offense such as tax evasion, fraud or concealment of the identity of the beneficial owner of a property will be the subject of a transmission to justice”, warns the new boss of Tracfin. The anti-money laundering unit cannot however seize itself, and must confine its action to the European regulation on the sanctions.
Misuse of public aid schemes
But Russia is far from being the only file on the agenda of Tracfin and its 200 agents. In fact, as the annual report for 2021 shows, the number of declarations and information of suspicion transmitted to the authorities, on all types of offenses, is constantly growing: more than 165,000, a figure up from 43%, mainly from professionals subject to the fight against money laundering (banks, insurers, legal professionals, gambling, real estate, etc.) and the rest from public bodies. More than 37 million notifications on cash deposits or withdrawals of more than 10,000 euros, accumulated over a calendar month, have also been sent to it automatically, as required by law.
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