Foreign regulators investigating origin of Russian residents' capital, may hinder amnesty - Chikhanchin
MOSCOW. March 23 (Interfax) - Russian citizens with accounts in Great Britain have already started receiving requests from the British authorities to indicate the origin of funds placed on their accounts, Federal Financial Monitoring Service Rosfinmonitoring Director Yuri Chikhanchin said at a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
"It must be noted that here it's necessary for our Russian citizens to factor in that one shouldn't wait for amnesty. In my opinion, it's still necessary to return capital. These 'chain letters' that Russian residents with accounts in England have received are nothing more than a signal," Chikhanchin said.
"All Russians with accounts there have been asked to prove the origin of the money," he added.
Asked by the president whether this meant that pretexts were being created to interfere with returning financial resources into Russian jurisdiction as part of the capital amnesty setup that is being prepared, Chikhanchin said: "They will include mechanisms for carrying out financial investigations and initiating criminal proceedings. And this will essentially not allow for money to be returned in the way that we'd like. That is, this is exactly what is connected with amnesty. This is why we're deeply involved with this."
He also said that Rosfinmonitoring has invited the chairman of a key committee of the Council of Europe to a round table planned for late March. At the meeting, the chairman will discuss how amnesty was carried out in other countries, as well as the problems that were encountered, Chikhanchin said.
He added that capital amnesty was subject to FATF regulation. "And any deviation [from this organization's rules] might cause us to be subject to sanctions, which is an important factor," Chikhanchin noted.
