week after the Island was left off an international list of countries accused of permitting money laundering.

The Group of Seven's Financial Action Task Force (FATF) yesterday released a list of 15 countries, including the Bahamas, Cayman Islands, Israel and Russia, which failed to pass the body's criteria on money laundering.

Others listed were: the Cook Islands, Dominica, Lebanon, Liechtenstein, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Niue, Panama, Philippines, St. Kitts and Nevis and St. Vincent and the Grenadines.

Gil Galvo, president of the FATF said the group would hold a "dialogue'' with the offending countries to help them improve legislation and monitoring aimed at reducing money laundering.

A statement from the Ministry of Finance pointed out that Bermuda's omission from the list means that it "passed scrutiny'' on all of the FATF's 25 criteria.

The criteria deal with loopholes in financial regulations and obstacles to international co-operation to Bermuda's laws and regulatory practices.

The statement reads: "The Ministry of Finance is pleased with this outcome as it validates Bermuda's reputation as a high quality and well regulated international financial services centre.'' The Island's two major banks both declined to comment on the news but the Bermuda International Business Association (BIBA), and the International companies division of the Chamber of Commerce (ICD) expressed delight.

Bermuda off list chairman of the ICD. "This reaffirms what we all know and speaks very highly to the way we conduct business particularly in incorporating companies and in applications for personal bank accounts.

"The laws and regulations have worked well for us both on the corporate and personal level,'' he added.

"I'm sure the procedures put in place by successive Bermuda governments will continue to serve us well, well into the future but it is certainly good to have received the recognition.'' Already expecting the news, Pat Philip Bassett, chief executive officer of BIBA said it was good that Bermuda was being "validated'' for its good practices.

"Basically we anticipated that Bermuda would not be on the list,'' she said.

And she said local international business and Government financial authorities have always been helpful and cooperative with international initiatives on the issue of money laundering.

"This decision is important because it validates our efforts here,'' she said. "These judgments going in our favour all contribute to that.''