Following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the city of New York,   efforts nationally and internationally were successful in the fight against terrorist financing.  However since that time the momentum has slowed down and is causing concern to those involved in the anti-corruption agencies of the world.  The problem comes from the success, ironically enough.  Standard means of money laundering were thwarted through investigations and amendments to the policies and procedures of the financial institutes of the world.  The financial institutions just did their jobs and they did them well.

This has served to cause the way in which terrorism cells and those who fund them are working.  Many rely on the donations of private citizens and organizations, transactions that are subversive and almost impossible to track.  Other criminal activities involving cash transactions such as the productions and distribution of illegal drugs is becoming commonplace.  And the use of informal financial institutions and methods as those of the hawala, sit outside the realm of the international financial systems and thus manage avoid regulation and detection.  The private sector along with the governments of the countries of the world need not think that it is now time to relax, for the work in uncovering the subversive methods of terrorist financing is just beginning.

The cooperation and the willingness to participate in the fight to bring terrorists down that was so evident immediately following 9/11, must be restored.  The continued effort to end the criminal activities of those involved in corruption on such a large scale as that of terrorism must be recognized if the citizens of the world are ever to be free from the threat of harm and fear.  The trouble is before the threat was so clear, so obvious, and now it is hard to see.  Lying under the surface so deep that it seems futile.  But this must serve to inspire those in government to work more diligently and wholeheartedly and the future of the world depends on it.

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