The Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) in collaboration with the Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC)-Rwanda, has organized a five-day regional workshop for Financial Intelligence Units (FIUs) as regards their operations in relation to combating Money Laundering (ML), Financing of Terrorism (FT), Financing of Proliferation (FP) and other related financial crimes. The training is in line with the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) international standards, which guide the fight against these crimes. The workshop, which aims at equipping participants with skills and competences required for FIUs being the driving force of the fight against these crimes, is running from 21^st to 25^th November 2022 in Kigali, Rwanda. During the first four days, twenty-four (24) officials from FIUs of Eswatini, Rwanda, Uganda and Zimbabwe shall be in attendance whilst on the final day, the training shall pool together a total of thirty-four (34) officials including representatives from Non-Profit Organizations sector of Rwanda.

On behalf of FIC Director General, Mr. Jean Bosco MURENZI, the Head of Compliance and Prevention department has officiated the training with deep gratitude of COMESA’s support to enhance regional officials to better understand AML/CFT/CFP ecosystem and effectively combating such scourge that is ravaging the financial systems of the region in particular and the world in general. He has urged all participants to seize this opportunity to acquire requisite knowledge and skills needed to effectively contribute in fighting against the above-mentioned crimes at the level of the COMESA zone.

Ms. Dalitso Bonongwe, the head of delegation of COMESA on this mission, has appreciated the Government and the FIC of Rwanda for facilitating the hosting of the workshop and the participating FIUs for availing their officials to participate in such an important event. She urged participants to make good use of the training opportunity to ensure that they gain extensive knowledge and share experiences and available best practices on the subject matter.

Ms. Bonongwe reminded the participants that FIUs have a very crucial but sensitive mandate, which among other things include production of intelligence, which should reflect value addition on the analysis done from the reports and information they receive. She expressed gratitude to the European Union for funding the programme through the African Peace and Security Architecture (APSA) facility, which has availed this training opportunity, among other interventions, relevant to fight against these financial crimes and promoting peace and security, in general.