January 27 2003, 10:57

FATF sanctions will make Ukraine out of WTO

Sanctions of FATF - an international organisations to combat money laundering - imposed on Ukraine because of insufficient work to counter illegal financial flows, will hamper attempts of Ukraine to become a member of World Trade Organisation, an expert of Carnegie Fund in Washington Anders Aslund believes.

He says the fact that Ukraine remains on the "black list" of FATF makes its membership in WTO impossible.

He expressed an opinion that strengthening of FATF sanctions against Ukraine could be explained by a series of factors. Besides the official version about imperfection of Ukrainian legislation, Aslund also names a personalia problem, in particular, discharging from the post of the head of Agency for Struggle with Money Laundering of Oleksiy Bereznyi.

Bereznyi has been considered in the West as a competent and reliable specialists, and also has had a reputation of a politically disinterested person, says Dr. Aslund.

Among another factors, the economist Aslund names an inflow into Ukraine of $1 billion of hardly explainable origin. The inflow continued during the whole 2002, while other countries had strengthened measures to combat money laundering.