In extreme situations, Kersten said, the sudden withdrawal of these huge sums of money could have consequences for national economies. Several speakers told the crime conference that organized crime now appears to be moving into the international telecommunications business, particularly in Eastern Europe. In some examples, criminal groups have bought financial control of a legal telecommunications company and then attached another company to it to carry out their illegal business. Thomas Pickard is assistant director of the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation. He said it is difficult to check how much of the money circulating around the world each day comes from crime groups seeking to hide their illegal profits.
Money laundering is probably one of the most difficult things to investigate.
It's very difficult with the volume of financial transactions each day to track down which are legitimate transactions and which are illegitimate. But at least one delegate to the conference had an idea about how to deal with international criminal gangs. Former Russian Interior Minister Anatolii Kulikov proposed an international forum to combat organized crime. He said he envisages an institution along the lines of the Davos Forum, which meets every year in Switzerland to discuss the world economy and related problems. He said other delegates support the idea and that he will visit Washington later this month to discuss the idea.