LATVIAN RESPONSE: FATF STATEMENT AND GUIDANCE ON

C O N F I D E N T I A L RIGA 000828

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/07/2017
TAGS: PARM PREL MNUC ECON LG
SUBJECT: LATVIAN RESPONSE: FATF STATEMENT AND GUIDANCE ON
IRAN

REF: SECSTATE 149648


1. (U) Poloff delivered reftel demarche to Judite Dobele, the
GOL MFA's Head of Middle East and Africa Division, Viesturs
Burkans, the GOL Prosecutor General's office Head of the
Financial Investigation Unit, and Janis Brazovskis, the GOL
Head of Financial Integrity Division in the Financial and
Capital Market Commission (FCMC). All three offices were
already familiar with the FATF actions, and recognized their
importance.


2. (U) Dobele underlined the systems in place to combat money
laundering, terrorism financing and WMP proliferation in
Latvia, and confirmed their commitment to continuing these
actions in the future. Dobele could not confirm whether there
were any Iranian businesses operating in Latvia, but they
doubted there were.


3. (U) Brazovskis stated that the FCMC had issued a letter on
July 10, 2007 advising Latvian banks to perform enhanced due
diligence on all customers doing business with Iran or who
were registers or were residents of Iran in order to ensure
that international sanctions were not violated and that
transactions of these clients had a lawful and economic
purpose and were in line with normal patters of clients'
business activities.


4. (C) Post understands that following Latvian Prime Minister
Aigars Kalvitis' November 2 meeting with Deputy Secretary of
Treasury Kimmett, Kalvitis personally called several leading
members in the Latvian banking community and urged them in
strong terms to ensure that there were no Iranian
transactions going through Latvia.
SELDOWITZ