Portrait

Since its foundation in 1978, AFP is tracking down hot money.

Many of our campaigns have been taken up by national and international institutions (for example in agreements concerning money laundering or judicial requests for assistance in cases of corruption). But the Swiss financial system still needs more democratic control , more transparency and a more just approach, especially in its relation to countries outside the OECD.We think it wrong that the most important decisions concerning the global financial system are decided by a small elite of the global market who is not democratically accountable.

At the moment, AFP is mainly working on the following topics:

1. Dealing with assets by dictators from Third World countries which are blocked on Swiss bank accounts; working together with NGOs in Third World countries to organise the return and the use of the money under conditions of democratic accountability and in the interest of the people concerned.
   
2. Enhancing the concept of odious debts by Third World countries and campaigning for a cancellation of debts of dubious origins which cripple the economy of peoples in the South.
   
3. New problems concerning the Swiss financial system, the infamous banking secrecy law and tax evasion. We are opposed to the politics, that Switzerland only pursues regulations with Western countries, the USA and EU. Such regulations must be valid for Swiss citizens as well as all foreign citizens, for rich as well as poor countries.
   
4. Supporting the International Apartheid Debt and Reparations Campaign which fights for the cancellation of apartheid debts and the right to reparations for all victims of human rights abuses; reparations which have to be paid by those who were responsible for the abuse and by those who profited from it.

A short history of AFP

• In 1978 AFP is founded in connection with the banking initiative by the Social-Democratic Party of Switzerland, to push the aspects of the initiative concerning the relation with the Third World and to represent the interests of the South (popular vote in 1984).



• From the beginning, AFP is campaigning and lobbying against tax evasion and assets by dictators parked on Swiss bank accounts (Duvalier, Marcos, Mobutu, Abacha and so on and on).



• Between 1982 and 1993, AFP is involved in the international campaign for financial sanctions against the apartheid regime in South Africa.



• In the 1980s, AFP is working towards the foundation of an alternative Swiss bank and is represented on its governing board and its ethical council. AFP draws up papers to regional banks and to alternative investment ideas.



• In 1990 AFP is involved with the campaign against the entry of Switzerland to IMF and World Bank (popular vote in 1991).



• In 1991 AFP together with Erklärung von Bern und other NGOs starts its campaign "For a Switzerland without hot money".



• In 1998, AFP is one of the founding members of the International Apartheid Debt and Reparations Campaign in Southern Africa.

Publications

Since 1981, AFP is publishing a regular magazine, Finanzplatz Informationen, published four times a year, in which we report on the very latest cases of dictator's money as well as on basic problems of the global financial system.

Furthermore, AFP produces brochures covering topical subjects (see link).