Under the patronage of His Majesty The King Mohammad VI, the King of Morocco, the Middle East and Africa Joint Typologies and Capacity Building Workshop is being held during the period from 22 to 25 January 2018 in the city of Rabat, the Kingdom of Morocco, which is co-organized by the Middle East and North Africa Financial Action Task Force (MENAFATF), the Eastern and Southern Africa Anti-Money Laundering Group (ESAAMLG), the Task Force on Money Laundering in Central Africa (GABAC) and the Inter-Governmental Action Group against Money Laundering in West Africa (GIABA), in cooperation with the Moroccan Financial Information Processing Unit (UTRF).

On this occasion, MENAFATF would like to extend its deepest thanks to all the concerned authorities in the Kingdom of Morocco, particularly the FIU, for hosting this workshop and for the warm welcome, excellent organization and generous hospitality. We would also like to thank all those who contributed to the preparation of this workshop and helped eliminate the difficulties encountered by the participants, as well as the participants who made the effort to attend and participate.

Hosting such an event in the Kingdom of Morocco shows how keen is the Kingdom to protect its economic system and its community from the risks of ML/TF crimes by raising the awareness and promoting the efficiency of its competent entities. It also indicates its aspiration to efficiently support the regional and international efforts in this field.

The participation of several experts whose number is approximately 250 participants from various countries and different regional and international organizations makes this workshop significantly important.

The workshop will discuss the latest developments on the regional and international scenes, and focus on important topics during its sessions which will be held over a period of four days, namely, “Money Laundering and Terrorists Financing, and the Smuggling of Goods”, “Money Laundering Through the Real Estate Sector”, “Terrorists Financing Risks”, “Financial Flows from Human Trafficking”, and “Professional Money Laundering Networks”.

This workshop is an opportunity to exchange expertise and best practices between countries in the field of typologies, to identify and study the latest ways, methods and trends used in ML/TF operations, and to benefit from the same in developing appropriate solutions.

We reiterate our gratitude for the high patronage of the Kingdom of Morocco, its esteemed government and our colleagues in the UTRF, as well as all the concerned authorities and all those who helped in the preparation and contributed to the organization of this workshop. We would also like to thank all the countries which were interested and participated in the event, and to extend our gratitude to the co-organizer FSRBs for their cooperation and efforts to this end.