After several scandals involving EU banks, the European Commission announced on Tuesday that it wanted to create an anti-money laundering agency as part of legislative proposals also aimed at better combating the financing of terrorism.

Brussels announced a year ago its desire to act, after several scandals which revealed the vulnerability of a fragmented legal system between the 27 member countries of the EU. Among these scandals, that linked to Danske Bank, at the heart of a money laundering case of around 200 billion euros between 2007 and 2015, via its Estonian subsidiary. Last month, Nordea's offices in Denmark were raided as part of an anti-money laundering investigation. Faced with these situations, the commission is announcing a new entity which will be responsible in particular for supervising and coordinating the national authorities. “The aim is to improve the detection of suspicious transactions and activities and close loopholes used by criminals,” the Commission explained.

Improving the repression of illicit transactions should therefore contribute to making it more difficult to finance attacks in Europe. The new agency, which will employ around 250 people, is expected to be operational from 2024. attack at the heart of crime,” EU Financial Services Commissioner Mairead McGuinness told a news conference. According to Commission Vice-President Valdis Dombrovskis, EU anti-money laundering rules are among the strictest in the world, but they now need to be applied consistently and closely monitored.

In addition, the application of anti-money laundering rules will be extended to the entire cryptocurrency sector in order to ensure the traceability of financial transfers in bitcoins.