The Conference of the Parties to the Council of Europe Convention on Laundering, Search, Seizure and Confiscation of the Proceeds of Crime and on the Financing of Terrorism recently published the conclusion of the updated thematic monitoring report.

The document assesses, for the first time, Morocco's compliance with several provisions of the treaty. According to this document, “Morocco must adopt legislative and institutional reforms in order to ensure effective implementation of the provisions of the Warsaw Convention. While significant progress has been made since the country's accession, full alignment with international standards remains an objective to be achieved. The Kingdom's continued commitment in this area will strengthen not only its system for fighting financial crime but also its cooperation with other member states.”

According to this report, while progress has been made by Morocco, substantial improvements should nevertheless be implemented. This is the case with Article 3, paragraph 4. According to the authors of the report, while “the Moroccan legislative framework currently allows offenders to provide evidence to refute prosecutors' allegations concerning the origin of property, there is however a lack of an explicit mechanism requiring offenders to prove the lawful origin of their property, as stipulated in the convention”. The thematic monitoring report also comments on article 14 concerning the deferral of suspicious transactions