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U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE
INTERNATIONAL NARCOTICS CONTROL STRATEGY REPORT MARCH 1996:
FINANCIAL CRIMES AND MONEY LAUNDERING
United States Department of State
Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs
ASSET SHARING
Pursuant to the provisions of the 1988 US law, the Departments of
Justice, State and Treasury have aggressively sought to encourage
foreign governments to cooperate in joint investigations of drug
trafficking and money laundering, offering the inducement of sharing in
forfeited assets. A parallel goal has been to encourage spending of
these assets to improve narcotics law enforcement. The long term goal
has been to encourage governments to improve asset forfeiture laws and
procedures, and undertake independent investigations.
From 1989 through December 1995, the international asset sharing program
administered by Justice resulted in the forfeiture in the US of
$124,679,340.22 of which $42,209,368.29 was shared with foreign
governments which cooperated in the investigations. In 1995, the
Department of Justice transferred forfeited proceeds to: Canada
($41,418.00), Israel ($34,770.00), Ecuador ($3,834,000.00) United
Kingdom ($523,393.00), and Switzerland ($2,098,000.00) Prior recipients
of shared assets (1989-1994) include: Argentina, the Bahamas, British
Virgin Islands, Canada, Cayman Islands, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador,
Egypt, Guatemala, Guernsey, Hungary, Liechtenstein, Paraguay, Romania,
St. Maarten, Switzerland, United Kingdom, Venezuela.
To date, Switzerland, the Isle of Jersey (Channel Islands) and the
United Kingdom are the only three jurisdictions that have shared
forfeited assets with the United States as the result of the assistance
of the United States to forfeitures effected under their own laws. In
1995, the United States also reached an asset sharing agreement with
Mexico that will serve as the basis to transfer forfeited assets from
the United States to Mexico in the future, as well as a reciprocal
sharing agreement with Canada.
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