Algeria has set its sights on the various crimes that are now classified as terrorist crimes. Including buying off individuals for the purpose of “sowing sectarian strife and financing racist extremist groups that have the ability to bear arms at any time.”
The draft law, which was presented to the National Assembly, on Monday, includes several legal measures in line with international treaties ratified by Algeria.
The law comes within the framework of adapting the Algerian legal system to international obligations, to improve and develop it in line with the new constitution, which Algeria considers the cornerstone of combating crime and organized crime.
The law seeks to combat money laundering in all its forms, whether it is theft, corruption or drug trafficking.
Penalties of up to 20 years in prison
Algeria relies on this law to adapt the legislative system to international laws that fight corruption and intercontinental crime.
The deterrent measures were defined by the tightening of penalties for criminals who carry out various forms of money laundering.
Algerian parliamentarian, Hicham Ben Haddad, told Sky News Arabia: “Despite the classification of the punishment as a misdemeanor, we trust the pledges of the Algerian Minister of Justice, Abd al-Rashid Tabib, who emphasized the determination of the judiciary to impose the maximum penalties for this type of crime.”
Parliamentarians have demanded that money laundering be classified as a felony, but the new law continues to classify it as a misdemeanor that carries a penalty of up to 20 years in prison.
The law stipulates the imposition of strict control over the financing of associations with huge sums from abroad or from any party.
More powers were granted to committees and bodies affiliated with the Ministry of Finance to participate in the fight against organized crime.
The government also sought to scrutinize terminology related to financial crimes, and not leave room for jurisprudence, given the sensitivity of the files and the complexity of the parties involved in money laundering crimes.
forms of terrorism
Political science researcher Salim Hammadi says that the term terrorism today has differed from what it used to be yesterday. It is no longer limited to the terrorist organizations that Algeria experienced in the nineties of the last century.
Hammadi told Sky News Arabia, “In addition to terrorist organizations, there are new forms of terrorism, including electronic terrorism and organizations that the authorities include in the list of extremism, such as the “Mac” and “Rashad” movements.
Algeria believes that these organizations seek to overthrow the regime in Algeria and create sectarian strife based on money laundering to finance their activities in Algeria.
Eyes on the black market
Experts view this law as a safety valve for societal security, which would contribute to eliminating hotbeds of corruption and protecting the national economy.
Over the past three decades, the black currency market has become the “square market”, constituting a financial empire that has the ability to influence Algeria’s financial stability at any moment because it possesses an estimated amount of $90 billion, according to unconfirmed estimates.
The parliamentarians demanded the necessity of closing the “square market”, with the necessity of activating the law of opening frozen exchange offices since 2014 to monitor the movement of hard currency and money laundering.
The enactment of this new law comes in line with the provisions of the Lausanne International Convention, which Algeria signed in 1998, with the aim of combating all forms of money laundering by reporting the movement of funds between banks.
Hammadi, a researcher in political science, believes that the failure to speed up the enactment of a law to combat the crime of money laundering contributed to the creation of large financial lobbies that began to practice commodity speculation and monopolize basic foodstuffs with the aim of destabilizing the country, through several methods, including bribery and encouraging administrative corruption.
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