Day 1:
The opening ceremony of the 5th International Conference on Financial Criminology was successfully officiated by the Vice Chancellor of Universiti Teknologi MARA, Dato' Sri Prof. Ir Dr Sahol Hamid Abu Bakar. Themed Global Trends in Financial Crimes in the New Economies, the two-day ICFC 2013 conference has attracted international participants from 11 countries, namely -Thailand, Singapore, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Republic of Iran, United Kingdom, Australia, India, Indonesia, Hong Kong and New Zealand. For local participants, apart from academics from public and private universities, there are also practitioners from the Accountants General Office, Auditor General Office, Dewan Bandaraya Kuala Lumpur (DBKL), Companies Commission of Malaysia (CCM), Securities Commission (SC), banks, local authorities, Registrar of Societies (ROS), Malaysian Institute of Corporate Governance (MICG), Cooperative Commission of Malaysia, Ministry of Finance, Association of Fraud Examiners (ACFE), Association of Anti-Money Laundering Specialists (ACAMS), Audit firms (including Big Four firms), Malaysian Anti Corruption Commission (MACC), Inland Revenue Board Malaysia (IRBM), Royal Malaysia Customs, Royal Malaysia Police, Labuan Offshore and the Attorney General Chambers (AGC). 
The day started with a welcome speech by the vice chancellor. This was then followed by the keynote speech "Economic Crimes and Governance" by Tan Sri Dato' Seri Haji Megat Najmuddin bin Datuk Seri Dr Haji Megat Khas which was read by his representative Mr Ahmad Shahab Haji Din from MICG. It has been emphasized in the keynote speech that there is strong correlation between the occurence of economic crimes with the level of governance being enforced in any organisation. In a nutshell, effective governance requires more than mere compliance of rules and procedures. The keynote address set the direction of the three plenary sessions afterwards. The first plenary session which was moderated by Tuan Awang Armadajaya (AGC) focused on the topic "The Evolution of Forensic Accounting in the Asia Pacific Region: What Does the Future Hold?". Two invited speakers to discuss the topic were namely (i) Mr Chris Fordham, Managing Partner, Fraud Investigation & Dispute Services Asia Pacific, Ernst & Young Advisory Services Ltd (UK) and (ii) Mr Petrus Gimbad, Member of the Board of Directors, Sabah Development Bank. The discussions highlighted the fact that globally, financial crimes which are dubbed as "crimes of the new millinieum" are on the rise. Whilst enforcement agencies and regulators are enhancing their competency level in this new knowledge, perpetrators are finding ways to hide "evidences" and to destroy audit trail. As such, effective fraud prevention programs must integrate multiple investigation techniques with the latest technologies and skills.
The second plenary session titled "Combating Tax Evasion and Money Laundering" was moderated by Professor Dr Normah Omar from ARI. To discuss the topic, ICFC 2013 has invited two speakers namely (i) The Chief Executive Officer of the Inland Revenue Board of Malaysia, Tan Sri Dr Mohd Shukor Haji Mahfar and Mr Aaron Lau, an accredited trainer for the Association of Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialists (ACAMS) certification program. Since 2010, the Anti Money Laundering and Anti Terrorism Financing Act (AMLATFA 2001) has been amended to include Tax Evasion as one of the predicate offences under this jurisdiction. As such, tax evasion constitutes a "proceed from an ill-gotten gain activity". Tan Sri Dr Shukor further proposed for the setting up of a "task force" from among various regulatory and enforcement agencies when investigating money laundering and tax evasion cases. 
Professor Dr Syed Noh Syed Ahmad, moderated the third plenary session on "Economic Crimes & their Impact on the Socio Economic Development". The two speakers for this session were (i) Dato' Akbar Satar, President of Transparency International Malaysia and (ii) Tan Sri Datuk Seri Dr Sulaiman Mahbob, Chairman, Malaysian Institute of Economic Research (MIER). Discussions centred on the "causes of economic crimes" and the "costs of Crimes". Globally, economic crimes have escalated and there is an urgent need for governments and countries to review possible "loopholes" in public and private policies that might give rise to financial crimes. 
After the lunch break, participants were presented with two more "heated" plenary sessions. The fourth plenary discussion titled "Prosecuting Economic Crimes" were presented by Supt Lee Ewe Kiang from the Royal Malaysia Police (RMP), Tuan Syed of AGC and Ms Shanti Geoffrey, from the Prosecution and Enforcement Division of the Securities Commission Malaysia. The three speakers gave relevant statistics to implicate the seriousness of the subject matter. It was concluded that the fight against economic crimes should be shouldered by everyone. Though it is almost impossible to totally eradicate financial crime, everyone can play a role to prevent fraud from happening.
The final plenary session for the day was deliberated by three more renowned speakers: Dato' Sri Abu Kassim Mohamed, Chief Commissioner of MACC; Mr Alex Tan of PwC Malaysia and Mr Nizam Ali of the Malaysian Institute of Integrity (IIM). Basically, the speakers discussed on the topic "The Global Challenges of Economic and Financial Crimes and How They Affect You and I". Participants were given a "small survey" to find out if they have given any kind of "bribes" within the last 12 months. The "result" from a total of 74 sample participants implicate that only a small number of four respondents (5%) have admitted bribery. Ironically, "Corruption Perceived Indexed" stood at a much higher rate, hence the issue of "reality vs perception" needs to be specifically addressed. Instead of subjecting themselves to "perceptional verdict", countries should develop their own indices. Mr Nizam of IIM spoke of the Corporate Integrity System that had been initiatited by his institute as a possible instrument to measure and benchmark integrity at work places. Throughout all five plenary sessions on the first day, participants were given the opportunity to interact with the invited speakers. The face-to-face interactions have produced some very interesting suggestions and recommendations.
