Daily Times

The Swiss parliament has approved the automatic exchange of bank data on regular basis with  Pakistan and 17  other countries, from 2021.

The 17 other countries are Albania, Azerbaijan, Brunei, Dominica, Ghana, Kazakhstan, Lebanon, Macau, Maldives, Nigeria, Niue, Oman, Peru, Samoa, Saint Martin, Trinidad and Tobago, and Vanuatu.

All these countries have been put on the list after they met the data security and confidentiality requirements.

And in return, Switzerland will receive information on banking details of accounts held by Swiss citizens/residents in these partner countries.

Meanwhile, the data will be exchanged to probe/stop money laundering or to refrain/collect tax absconder — the information that will be shared includes accounts and tax identification numbers, surname, first name, address and date of birth of the taxpayer, types of income and account balance.

In the partner countries, the financial team will exchange bank data with its own country, then the country will pass the information to the Swiss government.

The developmental is yet another move in the already list of  75 countries with whom the Swiss government shares the details of bank accounts of their citizens.

Aside from Switzerland, over 90 states and territories, including all major financial centers, have already exchanging such accounts with each other.

Back in 2014, with the put up of the G20, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) drew up an international standard Automatic Exchange of Information on Financial Accounts (AEOI) to enable countries to exchange bank information automatically.

Recently, the Swiss authorities revealed that they had provided details of around 3.1 million bank accounts held by foreigners to their countries of origin or residence. In return, it received information on banking details of around 2.4 million accounts held by Swiss citizens/residents in 75 partner countries.

It is to mention here, that in Nov 2018, Pakistan and Swiss governments signed an MoU enabling an exchange of financial information on a bilateral basis that will enable Pakistani authorities to seek Swiss bank account details of Pakistanis, in what was described as a major step ahead in bringing back looted wealth.

Asset Recovery Unit
In 2018, the Pakistani government had established a task force named ‘Asset Recovery Unit’ to bring back money which has been illegally shifted abroad.

The Asset Recovery Unit (ARU) comprising members of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) and the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA).

The first success ARU got on May 2019, by recovering Rs 530 million illegal money from Singapore: the name of the account holder remained undisclosed.

Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf led government, currently probing more than 10,000 properties of Pakistani people; which may have transferred the money abroad, illegally — in the first phase, the government has asked the UK and UAE to help them in recovering the looted money.