Word: banco
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...smooth the way for talks with the North. However, Hill said that while the U.S. lacks hard evidence, it intends to press Pyongyang for "complete clarity" on the program. Indeed, rather than lightening up on the North, U.S. Treasury Department officials appear poised to issue permanent sanctions against Banco Delta Asia, the Macau bank where about $24 million in assets allegedly belonging to North Korean officials have been frozen on grounds that the money is linked to illicit North Korean businesses, including counterfeiting. Pyongyang has been adamant that economic sanctions be lifted in exchange for cooperation on nuclear talks...
...size of a man's toys equal the size of his wallet, then Andres Ergas' newest plaything is a good fit. Until 2000, his family owned the Banco de Chile, the country's No. 2 bank. And after 15 years in the family business, Ergas, 40, has lost interest. "There is nothing true about banking," he says. "Money, it's just a commodity." It is, however, useful nonetheless to breach the old adage and mix business with pleasure...
...York on March 4, U.S. and North Korean diplomats began discussing normalization of relations, while Treasury Department officials in Macau were in discussions aimed at allowing Banco Delta Asia to unfreeze North Korean accounts frozen at Washington's behest. (The accounts allegedly belong to high ranking North Korean officials involved in a variety of illicit businesses, including narcotics smuggling and the counterfeiting of United States currency...
...punters from mainland China, it has surpassed the Las Vegas Strip as the world's biggest gambling center. As it has grown, Macau has begun to shed its image as a shady place that handles illicit international finance. When the U.S. Treasury Department in 2005 named Macau's Banco Delta Asia a "willing pawn" in money laundering for Pyongyang, regulators in Macau agreed to freeze $24 million in North Korean funds held by the bank. Given the crackdown, it may well have been embarrassing for a potential heir of the nuclear-armed hermit kingdom's ruler...
...presumption, then, is that U.S. engineered financial sanctions that have so irritated Pyongyang will be dealt away as part of a grand compromise. The U.S. clearly struck a nerve when in September 2005 the Treasury Department pressured a Macao bank, Banco Delta Asia, to freeze North Korean accounts held there. (Treasury accomplished this mainly by getting major banks in the U.S. to shut down their correspondent accounts with Banco Delta Asia, effectively isolating it from the international financial system). The U.S. has said it suspects the North uses the accounts to launder money gained through counterfeiting U.S. currency and narcotics...