MONEYVAL published today its annual report for 2022 which warns that the recovery of proceeds from crime across states remains insufficient and calls on governments to step up their efforts to strengthen their national frameworks for asset management and recovery. Elżbieta Frankow-Jaśkiewicz, Chair of MONEVYAL, presented MONEYVAL’s achievements and results of the annual Report before the Committee of Ministers on 14 June 2023, and took part in an exchange of views on MONEYVAL’s priorities and strategic directions, as set out in MONEYVAL’s Strategy for 2023 -2027.
In its monitoring work, MONEYVAL has found that successful confiscations of criminal assets are relatively rare compared with the estimates of the proceeds of crime. It, therefore, underlines the need not only to freeze but also to seize and confiscate criminal funds. To achieve this, enhancing the powers and resources of criminal asset recovery and management offices is crucial.
“States should not only improve their results in identifying and freezing criminal funds. There is also an urgent need for them to greatly improve their results in confiscating and managing criminal assets, adopt stricter sanctions and increase the number of convictions for serious money laundering offences”, said Elżbieta Frankow-Jaśkiewicz, Chair of MONEVYAL.
“Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine has highlighted the link between authoritarian regimes, corrupt actors and illicit financial flows. The need to deny illicit actors access to the funds and resources used to facilitate harmful activities, including those that can undermine European security and stability, has become even more apparent. Governments should invest more in their national programmes to combat money laundering and terrorist financing and adopt stricter policies to prevent the laundering of proceeds associated with corrupt regimes”, she stressed. 
In its annual report, MONEYVAL assesses compliance with international standards and developments in the legal and institutional frameworks to combat money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism (ML/CFT) in the 33 member states and territories subject to its monitoring as of 31 December 2022.
MONEYVAL member states and territories continued, on average, to demonstrate a moderate level of effectiveness in combating money laundering and the financing of terrorism. The best results were achieved in risk management, international cooperation and the use of financial intelligence. Compliance with international standards remained particularly weak in financial sector supervision, private sector compliance, transparency of legal persons, money laundering convictions and confiscations, and sanctions for terrorism financing and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.
With regard to technical compliance with recommendations concerning legislative and institutional reforms, MONEYVAL members showed excellent results: they fully implemented 72% of the recommendations.
By the end of 2022, 21 of the 26 jurisdictions evaluated by MONEYVAL in the 5th round of mutual evaluations were subject to its enhanced follow-up procedure for their limited  level of compliance with AML/CFT standards: Albania, Andorra, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Georgia, Gibraltar, Hungary, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Monaco, Malta, Poland, Republic of Moldova, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, the UK Crown Dependency of the Isle of Man and Ukraine. Armenia, the Holy See, Liechtenstein, San Marino and Israel (the latter was jointly evaluated by the FATF and MONEYVAL) are subject to MONEYVAL’s regular follow-up procedure.
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The Committee of Experts on the Evaluation of Anti-Money Laundering Measures and the Financing of Terrorism (MONEYVAL) is a monitoring body of the Council of Europe entrusted with the task of assessing compliance with the principal international standards to counter money laundering, the financing of terrorism and proliferation financing, as well as the effectiveness of their implementation.. MONEYVAL evaluates 33 countries and territories* and makes recommendations to national authorities in respect of necessary improvements to their AML/CFT systems. It contributes actively to the global fight against money laundering and the financing of terrorism by working closely with other key international partners, notably the FATF and other FATF-Style Regional Bodies (FSRBs) in the global network of AML/CFT assessment bodies, the European Union and the United Nations. 
 (*) Due to its exclusion from the Council of Europe on 16 March 2022, the Russian Federation is no longer a member of MONEYVAL. 
 

• Link to the report