The governor of the Central Bank announced Thursday that a five-member committee was prepared to freeze the bank accounts of any suspected terrorist organizations in the country. Riad Salameh said the committee, which he would head, would have no trouble examining any account that was forwarded by a foreign country or organization. “Tracing and freezing terrorist money in Lebanon will be an easy task for the Central Bank after the April implementation of the money-laundering law,” he said. On Monday, the United States announced that it would freeze the international bank accounts of more than 26 suspected terrorist organizations. The US government asked Lebanon to help track any suspicious terrorist money in any of the country’s banks. “If we have enough evidence linking any bank account to a terrorist group, we will immediately freeze the account until the Lebanese justice department decides what to do about this money,” Salameh said. He added that although the Central Bank had not yet received any requests to freeze a specific account, one of the reasons why the committee was first formed two months ago, was to combat money-laundering. The government is keen to implement all of the 25 articles by the Financial Action Task Force, the G7 body entrusted with stamping out dirty money activities around the world. Currently, Lebanon is one of the few countries with a banking secrecy law which assures the anonymity of its depositors. Last year, the task force named Lebanon as one 15 countries not doing enough to combat money-laundering. But despite the implementation of April’s money-laundering law, the task force has kept Lebanon’s name on the list of countries that have taken insufficient steps to fight dirty money. However, it did praise the efforts of the Central Bank and the Banking Control Commission to implement the law. “We are confident that Lebanon’s name will be removed from the list at the next FATF meeting,” Salameh said. A task force delegation was scheduled to visit here this fall to examine anti-laundering steps taken so far; however, that visit has been postponed, although banking sources said it would still happen soon. Salameh said the task force would not try to impede the international operations of any Lebanese banks, and he predicted that once the country’s name is removed from the list, “international investors and bankers will be more inclined to operate here.” The governor went further, saying that the global economic recession, combined with the sharp fall in the value of shares following the terrorist attacks in America, could encourage Arab investors to shift some of their assets here. “The return on investments in Lebanon is much higher and less risky than the international stock markets,” he said. Some bankers said the banking secrecy law, along with a high return on deposits, would be the main attraction for investing here.