Bangladesh Bank Governor Dr Ahsan H Mansur on Tuesdy said several crisis-prone Islami banks will be merged into one under state ownership to protect depositors' interests.

“The central bank’s first priority is securing depositors’ assets or money. Whether banks survive or not is a secondary matter,” said the governor while addressing a press conference marking the publication of the annual report of the Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit (BFIU), a wing of the central bank. 

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Responding to a question, Dr Mansur said investigations into money laundering cases are sometimes delayed due to inter-ministerial non-cooperation and complex role-sharing among different entities.

He expressed the hope that investigations would gain momentum following amendments to the ‘Money Laundering Act’, which would empower the taskforce to recover stolen funds more effectively.

Meanwhile, Bangladesh has improved its position by 13 notches, rising to 59th from 46th in the Basel Anti-Money Laundering (AML) Index 2024, according to BFIU head AFM Shahinul Islam.

Speaking at the same press conference, Shahinul Islam attributed the improvement to the country’s recent intensified anti-money laundering initiatives.

He informed that 17 agencies reported a total of 27,130 incidents of Suspicious Transaction Reports (STR) and Suspicious Activity Reports (SAR) between July 2024 and May 2025. Of those, the BFIU alone received 17,345 STR and SAR reports, marking a 23 percent increase from the previous year.

The BFIU forwarded 114 intelligence reports to various law enforcement and investigative agencies.

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Besides, it shared 1,220 pieces of information with relevant agencies investigating money laundering cases, a 13.91 percent rise compared to the previous year.

Senior officials of Bangladesh Bank and BFIU were present at the press conference.