A two-day OSCE workshop held on 13–14 November in Ulaanbaatar convened 27 representatives from Mongolia’s Independent Authority Against Corruption (IAAC), the Financial Regulatory Commission, law enforcement agencies, financial institutions, and other relevant bodies to strengthen national capacities in addressing money-laundering risks linked to virtual assets and blockchain-based finance.
The workshop emphasized practical aspects of compliance, supervision, and investigation in the virtual asset sector. Participants gained hands-on experience with blockchain analytics tools and explored regulatory and institutional approaches to mitigate emerging risks. Key topics included best practices for financial institutions serving virtual asset businesses, due diligence, on-chain transaction monitoring, and the importance of inter-agency cooperation and information sharing to combat illicit finance.
Zurab Sanikidze, Senior Project Officer and Project Manager at the OSCE, highlighted the initiative’s goal of supporting Mongolia in building stronger regulatory and investigative capacities for virtual assets to ensure a safer and more transparent financial environment. Jargalbaatar Chimeddorj, Head of the Investigation Unit and Senior Commissioner at the IAAC, emphasized that the support is timely given the rapidly evolving challenges posed by the virtual asset sector.
The discussions also covered Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism (AML/CFT) supervision of crypto firms under the EU’s Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) regulation, collaboration between financial institutions and law enforcement, and effective mechanisms for reporting and freezing crypto assets.
The workshop was organized by the OSCE Office of the Co-ordinator of Economic and Environmental Activities (OCEEA) as part of the extrabudgetary project “Innovative Policy Solutions to Mitigate Money-Laundering Risks of Virtual Assets,” which is financially supported by the Governments of Germany, Italy, Poland, Romania, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
