MULTAN, Dec 28th:European Union states have stopped the transaction/transfer of money to Pakistani exporters,traders, manufacturers through Habib Bank Limited.Consequently,a money crunch has developed in the industry involved in business with European Union. Besides suspending the flow of foreign exchange which caused the devaluation of Pak rupee. Hundreds of exporters including eight exporters from Multan were directly hit due to freezing of their transactions. Chairman of All Pakistan Bed sheet & Upholstry Manufacturers Association (APBUMA)Syed Muhammad Aasim Shah said that concerned bank management has assured to clear their transactions till Dec 15,2017 but now two week have been elapsed but no positive response was received.which caused a state of uncertainty.Now value added sector and other manufacturers have no resources to purchase the raw material and clearing the wages of their workers.Government should come forward for the rescue of exporters and it should take up this issue with the European Union on diplomatic level.Sources said that Anti Money Laundering department of European Union has levelled allegation of money laundering on Habib Bank and is considering to impose penalty like American regulators who had imposed penalty of $225 million dollars for violating the international banking rules. Sources said that rulers and influential people of Pakistan used Pakistani banks for money laundering .The Department of Financial Services (DFS)went on to state that more than 13,000 transactions with SWIFT payment messages were carried out that omitted essential information, such as the identities of the ultimate originator and beneficiary of each transaction.However, HBL spokesman said said there are no criminal charges against HBL. No specific wrongdoing was identified as was noted in the fraud of the London Interbank Offered Rate (Libor), he said. There are no accusations, like Libor-fixing, against HBL, he added.HBL CEO Nauman Dar said the penalty has no logic. But he emphasised that the bank will pay the penalty if it is in a “reasonable amount”. He did not elaborate what he meant by “reasonable amount”.He further said that money transactions from European Union would soon be restored.European Union states are considering measures which would allow them to temporarily stop people withdrawing money from their accounts to prevent bank runs, an EU document revealed.The move is aimed at helping rescue lenders that are deemed failing or likely to fail, but critics say it could hit confidence and might even hasten withdrawals at the first rumors of a bank being in trouble.The proposal, which has been in the works since the beginning of this year, comes less than two months after a run on deposits at Banco Popular contributed to the collapse of the Spanish lender.It also come amid a bitter wrangle among European countries over how to deal with troubled banks, roughly a decade after a financial crash that required the European Central Bank to print billions of euros to prevent a prolonged economic slump.Giving supervisors the power to temporarily block bank accounts at ailing lenders is “a feasible option,” a paper prepared by the Estonian presidency of the EU said, acknowledging that member states were divided on the issue.
