Combatting Terrorism Financing: Right Wing Extremism Emerges as Priority, But Detection Remains a Challenge
Right wing extremism (RWE) is no longer an ignored aspect of the fight against terrorism financing. The FATF, Europol and others have declared it to be one of their priorities and better knowledge of risks and risk indicators has started to emerge. Despite this increased attention, detecting the financing of RWE has several challenges.
Today’s expression of RWE is multifaceted and slippery and balancing between legal and illegal activity makes it difficult to pin down what to look for. Over the past few decades, it has become evident that there is a knowledge gap surrounding RWE, with the fight against terrorism being very much equated with fighting jihadism.
The toolbox for combating terrorism financing has always had its flaws and the current methodology seems even more problematic with regard to RWE. Yet, it has also been observed that (so far) RWE individuals and groups make less effort to hide their financial transactions from plain sight. Hence, there is an opportunity for financial institutions to monitor and detect RWE related financial flows. Click here to view our latest white paper 'Detecting the financing of right wing extremism: Challenges and opportunities’ authored by Acuminor’s Senior Intelligence Analyst Mara Wesseling.
Download Detecting the Financing of Right-Wing Extremism.pdf
