Parliament Hill in Ottawa on July 21, 2020.Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press
Canada’s banks have joined a new partnership with Canada’s fentanyl czar, Ottawa and law enforcement to co-ordinate efforts to stem money laundering linked to drug trafficking.
The federal government launched the Integrated Money Laundering Intelligence Partnership to increase co-ordination between law enforcement agencies and financial institutions to respond to organized crime and money laundering schemes, according to a statement from the Finance Department Thursday evening.
The group includes the chief anti-money laundering officers of Canada’s biggest banks, and officials from the RCMP Federal Policing program.
U.S. President Donald Trump has made fentanyl enforcement a major sticking point in his threat to levy tariffs on Canada. He has said that illegal migration and the smuggling of fentanyl from Canada pose “a grave threat” to the U.S.
On Feb. 3, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau promised to implement a fentanyl czar as one of several border-control measures to avoid Mr. Trump’s proposed across-the-board tariffs.
While Canada accounts for less than 1 per cent of illegal fentanyl crossing the border into the U.S., Ottawa has said that it intends to crack down on the production and distribution of the drug.
“Canada is taking significant action to stop the production and trafficking of illegal fentanyl, and since no amount of fentanyl is too small to tackle, our goal is to eliminate it completely from our communities,” Canada’s newly appointed fentanyl czar Kevin Brosseau said in a statement. “This requires us to use every tool at our disposal, and intelligence sharing to combat money laundering is one of them.”
Mr. Brosseau launched the first meeting of the IMLIP on Wednesday, coordinated by the Department of Finance and Public Safety Canada. The departments will assist in creating a formalized governance structure authorized by law, and provide policy support.
Even before Mr. Trump’s threats, Canada was ramping up financial crime prevention efforts ahead of a 2026 evaluation by the Financial Action Task Force, a global body that sets standards to combat financial crime.
Bank involvement in fentanyl and drug trafficking has been in the spotlight since Toronto-Dominion Bank came under investigation by U.S. regulators and the Department of Justice.
The Canadian bank pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit money laundering, agreeing to pay a more than US$3-billion penalty.