An EU regulation combating money laundering would prevent criminals from exploiting weaknesses or loopholes and facilitate the operations of honest businesses, especially those present in more than one EU state,” MEP David Casa said.

Addressing the European Parliament’s plenary session, he referred to the situation in Malta saying journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia was murdered because the Maltese institutions failed to do their duty.

“When our supervisory institutions fail to investigate cases of corruption and money laundering, it falls on investigative journalists to expose these crimes,” he said.

Casa insisted that anti-money laundering rules should not be left on paper but had to be enforced.

“Laws are not worth the paper they are printed on unless they are enforced. Enough with criminal banks continuing to operate, despite overwhelming evidence of their facilitating money laundering. Enough with accounting firms, such as Nexia BT, that continue to operate in a parallel universe where laws do not apply to them.

“We must rise to the occasion, and ensure no person is ever left standing alone between criminals and their ill-gotten gains,” he said.

The EPP group’s spokesperson on anti-money laundering in the Committee for Economic and Monetary Affairs, Casa led Wednesday’s debate on behalf of the EPP Group.