AMLC starts hunt for Napoles' foreign accounts, transactions

MANILA, Philippines - The Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) have started its hunt for the foreign bank accounts and international transactions of alleged pork barrel scam mastermind Janet Lim-Napoles, an official said Thursday.

AMLC Executive Director Julia Bacay Abad said that they are now coordinating with the agency's counterparts abroad to help in the hunt for Napoles' foreign accounts.

“We have asked the assistance of our counterparts and of foreign law enforcement agencies --- just like in our other cases --- we make it a point to do that because there's always a possibility that transactions are being made outside the Philippines so there's really a need for international cooperation,” Abad said after the budget hearing at the Senate.

Abad said that the agency has identified at least 400 bank accounts involving Napoles and her associates, 100 are directly named under Napoles.

She added that they are tracing all the accounts including those in the United States.

“If there's a determination that the subject bank account are related to money laundering activities, then any account related to it should be included in the petition and frozen as well,” Abad explained.

Meanwhile, Abad said that the AMLC has also started looking into the accounts of some lawmakers mentioned in the joint probe of the Office of the Ombudsman and the Department of Justice.

Several lawmakers, including senators, have been tagged in the P10 billion pork barrel scam which Napoles allegedly masterminded.

The Senate Blue Ribbon Committee has also started its own probe on the pork barrel scam based on Commission on Audit's special audit report on the lawmakers' Priority Development Assistance Fund from 2007 to 2009.

The report revealed that nearly 200 lawmakers allocated P6.15 billion in pork barrel in 2007 to 2009 to 82 non-government organizations, some of which are dubious.