On December 10 to 14, 2012 at the OECD Tax Multilateral Center in Mexico was held the seminar on Taxes and Crime: detection of illicit financial activities, which main purpose was to assist the ministries of finance and tax administrations in Latin America and the Caribbean in the implementation of the legal and administrative framework to ensure effective policy coordination for the financial crime repression at inter-governmental level.

Since last year, CIAT has joined forces with the OECD to promote cooperation between the States institutions to improve the fight against economic crime and to promote knowledge of the criminal dynamics among tax auditors intrinsically connected with corruption, asset laundering and, in general, illicit financial flows. This effort, which finds its maximum expression at the global level within the activities of the “Dialogue of Oslo”, has led the CIAT, the OECD and the SHCP to develop an activity that allows promoting the effective implementation of the inter-institutional cooperation in Latin America and the Caribbean in this important sector.

So, on December 10 to 14 a panel of experts was formed with representatives from the Italian mission to the CIAT Executive Secretariat (Guardia di Finanza of Italy), from the IRS of the United States of America, from the CRA of Canada to try and discuss with great level of detail, topics linked to political, legal, structural, procedural and operating aspects that make the adequate implementation of this practice.

Among the participants were representatives from the ministries of finance and tax administrations of Mexico, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Jamaica, Guatemala, Dominican Republic, Paraguay and Uruguay.

As a result, the last day a roundtable was coordinated to meet specific demands and key issues that should be addressed in the region and in turn, be considered in future editions of the seminar. These demands include the need to promote and enhance the interaction of tax administrations with other intelligence and police information networks in order to share data and concerns that may be of common interest both on fiscal issues as well as the repression of complex and transnational criminal conducts.