MOST MONEY LAUNDERING LINKED TO DRUGS

More than 95 per cent of money-laundering cases filed with courts in
2003 involved drug trafficking, according to a senior official at the
Attorney General's Office.

Surasak Trirattrakul, the special public prosecutor for money
laundering cases, said the Anti-money Laundering Office (AMLO) had
submitted over 100 cases to state attorneys for further court action
between January 1 and December 31, 2003.

State attorneys, meanwhile, approved 108 cases and forwarded them to
the court during the same period.

In these cases, 95 per cent of the suspects were drug traffickers
arrested by authorities in the war against drugs, a period in which
the number of money-laundering cases shot up dramatically compared to
the same period a year earlier.

The average amount of assets confiscated by authorities was Bt7
million to Bt10 million per case.

Most of the suspects had transferred assets to other people or turned
the money earned from drugs into land, vehicles, stocks or insurance
policies.

Surasak said that some suspects had transferred money to foreign bank
accounts.

Because of closer cooperation between state attorneys and the AMLO,
nearly all cases forwarded by the agency ended up in court for a
verdict by the Attorney General's Office, once facts were verified.