The central bank has directed insurance and securities institutions to set up an anti-money laundering mechanism this year, and is likely to ask some non-financial sectors to do the same.

"We need the insurance and securities sectors to set up an (internal) arm and devise rules against money laundering this year," Tang Xu, head of the anti-money laundering department of the People's Bank of China (PBOC), the country's central bank, said during a live Internet conference yesterday.

This is PBOC's latest move to intensify its fight against money laundering. Earlier, it ordered the banking industry to devise a system to monitor and report dubious money flow.

Some specific non-financial institutions such as law and accounting firms and auction houses are the others that could be directed to set up similar mechanisms, Tang said.

"We will study these sectors one by one and map out reporting and inspection regimes for dubious transactions."

Securities and insurance companies will have to send data on dubious deals to the anti-money laundering monitoring center of the central bank from October 1, he said.

China intensified efforts to improve its anti-money laundering regime by passing an anti-money laundering law late last year and issuing rules on checking the possible flow of funds for terrorists last month.

It has joined hands with the Ministry of Public Security to set up a network to check the identity of banks' customers. The system went into force in late June, and all the country's banks have joined it, PBOC deputy governor Su Ning told a press briefing yesterday.

If a bank official wants to check a customer's identity he just needs to click a few times for the computerized image of his ID to pop up on the screen, the PBOC official said.

(China Daily July 27, 2007)