Tracing Osama's Swiss accounts may not be easy

By Alok Mukherjee

BERNE, SEPT. 25. The Swiss accounts of Osama bin Laden, if they exist, will be difficult to trace, despite the recent amendments to the secrecy clause in Swiss banking principles.

Uncomfortable with the tag of being the major custodian of ``dirty money,'' Switzerland had recently strengthened its criminal laws to counter the misuse of banking confidentiality, but the rules and procedures still weigh heavily in favour of ``discretion'' Swiss bankers employ while dealing with their clients.

Tracing a ``benami'' account, which Osama would have obviously opted for if his money is in Switzerland, is an onerous task. Switzerland has some 375 banks, a very large number for a small country, with the bulk of them being regional and savings banks. In fact, big banks in Switzerland are only three, while there are some 204 ``other banks'' and about 17 are ``private banks'' where extreme confidentiality about the client is maintained. Tracing the accounts through this intricate web of banking operations is a difficult task, Swiss banking authorities told The Hindu.

The authorities, however, say that things have somewhat changed in Switzerland to maintain a balance between criminal misuse of banking secrecy clause and the need to offer ``respectable bank customers the discretion they require''.

Before accepting a new deposit, Swiss banks follow the practice of ``knowing your customer'' under which they try to identify the person through his passport or other authoritative documentation and where appropriate, try to establish the real beneficial owner of the funds in case somebody else is acting on behalf of the actual client. The names of the holders of numbered accounts are also known to some people in the bank.

But such information is available with a very small group of people in a particular bank or its branch and that again is mostly restricted to the accounts they service. General information about the clients is not available and Swiss bankers are required to provide information only when criminal proceedings have been brought against their customers. Otherwise, ``respectable customers'' are offered the confidentiality they desire when it comes to protection of privacy, with no `ifs' or `buts.'

The problem with tracing Osama's accounts is that they would obviously have frontmen and these could well be ``respectable'' persons since Osama is not a common criminal and has supporters who believe in his cause. Linking such persons with Osama would be an extremely difficult task and would involve going through the numerous accounts that the Swiss banking system has. Alternatively, it would depend on some individual banker to disclose information in case he has reasons to suspect that the account under his charge could be linked in some way with Osama.

Some preliminary, but rather amateurish attempts have been made by some Swiss bankers to trace Osama-linked account. Random searches on computers with a combination of search-words like Osama, Laden etc. have resulted in unearthing junk information, conceded a Swiss banking industry source.

At the level of the Swiss Federal Government, queries about possible Osama accounts in Swiss banks elicited a simple response. ``We have blocked all the money that Osama bin Laden has in Swiss banks. But we can't block what we don't know to be his,'' explained a Minister in the Government.

The one strong possibility of any Osama accounts in Swiss banks coming out in the open would be availability of concrete information about the frontmen and the network that protects Osama's accounts in different safe havens. In case such information is found out, it would then be possible to pin down the Osama accounts, Swiss banking sources say.

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