It is worth mentioning that Britain has decided not to enact this Euro-law as the Government believes that British law already follows nearly all of its precepts. In many cases, it argues, British law already goes much further.

MLD VI concentrates on the definitions of various types of economic crime and various sanctions connected to them. It also aims to make EU countries collaborate more closely with one another when tackling money launderers.

This article explores the four main points of the directive.

1. The money laundering offence explained and extended

What constitutes a ‘money laundering offence’? Article 3(1) specifies the types of conduct that will be punishable as criminal offences when it is enshrined in national laws. One prominent example will occur when there is a transfer of property and the transferor (whoever that may be) knows that it is derived from ‘criminal activity’ and his purpose is to conceal or disguise its illicit origin. This will now constitute an EU-wide money laundering offence.

MLD VI will also, when it becomes enshrined in national laws, narrow ‘criminal activity’ down to twenty-two predicate offences. If someone is to be found guilty of a money laundering offence, at least one of these predicate offences (listed in Article 2(1)) will have to be evident.

Two predicate offences on the list are cyber-crime and environmental crime. This is the first time that ‘cyber-crime’ is mentioned in any AML directive.

Additionally, the directive seeks to extend the EU offence of money laundering to ‘aiding and abetting’ (Article 4). The aim of this measure is to force every EU country to convict accomplices who aid people in their commission of money laundering offences.

2. Criminal liability for 'legal persons' and concomitant sanctions

If any people in an organisation commit a money-laundering offence and/or aid and abet anyone who launders money for a company’s benefit, the directive aims to extend criminal liability to that organisation/legal person/company.

With money-laundering charges about to fall on legal persons, strict sanctions and penalties are in the offing. Some will take the shape of criminal and non-criminal fines. Article 8 lists other punitive sanctions, namely: disqualification from the practice of commercial activities (temporarily or permanently); judicial supervision; exclusion from accessing public benefits and funding; and/or the closure of the establishment that the money launderers have used.

3. Heftier penalties for people

It is also worth noting that every ‘natural person’ will now face a maximum term of imprisonment of at least four years for committing a money-laundering offence. In other words, the very highest money-laundering prison sentence on every EU country's statute book cannot be lower than four years. The EU is going to require its subject nations to increase this from the present one year. It is worth mentioning that many EU member states already hand out far higher sentences than four years even for minor offences.

4. Co-operation between countries

Finally, the upcoming directive insists on collaboration between EU states in the prosecution of people and firms who are conducting money-laundering offences.

For example, in Article 10(3), if a money laundering offence has occurred within the jurisdiction of more than one member state, those states will be obliged to pick one of their number as the co-ordinating jurisdiction. In other words, they will have to centralise proceedings in one country.

The directive also lists the factors they ought to consider when reaching this decision. These consist of the territory where the offence was committed, the nationality or residency of the offender, the country of origin of the victim(s) and the territory in which the authorities found the offender.

[Editor's note: the predicate offences for money laundering, listed in Article 2(1), are: racketeering; terrorism; people trafficking; sexual exploitation; illicit trafficking in drugs; illicit arms trafficking; handling stolen goods; corruption; fraud; the counterfeiting of currency; the counterfeiting of products (the EU is run more and more for the benefit of big business); environmental crime; murder and grievous bodily harm; kidnapping; robbery or theft; smuggling, where different from the trafficking of people and illegal arms and drugs; tax crimes; extortion; forgery, where different from counterfeiting; piracy; insider dealing and market manipulation; and cyber-crime. This is the first time that cyber-crime has appeared in a money-laundering directive.]

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