CRIMINALS LAUNDER UP TO $17 BILLION IN CANADA

About 70 per cent of money laundered through Canada is from drug
trafficking, agency says

Money laundering is the process by which revenues derived from
criminal activity are converted into assets that cannot be easily
traced back to their origin.

By concealing the origins of money, criminals can avoid confiscation
and forfeiture of criminally derived proceeds, and can make it more
difficult for the authorities to detect underlying criminal
activities.

Proceeds-of-crime forfeiture laws and similar measures are widely
believed to provide a more effective deterrent to such crimes than
the traditional criminal sanctions of fines and imprisonment.

Since both money laundering and the underlying criminal activities
are by their nature hidden, it is difficult to ascertain the scale on
which money laundering can takes place.

In Canada, the federal government estimates that $5 billion to $17
billion in criminal proceeds are laundered in this country each year.

About 70 per cent of money laundered through Canada is derived from
drug trafficking, according to the Financial Action Task Force on
Money Laundering, an inter-governmental body set up in 1989 by the
G-7 leaders to co-ordinate anti-money -laundering efforts.

The rest comes from tobacco and alcohol smuggling, illegal gambling
and white-collar crimes such as fraud, counterfeiting and
computer/telecommunications crimes.