On July 17, 2012,  a Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations report and hearing reviewed how HSBC and its U.S. affiliate exposed the U.S. financial system to a wide array of money laundering, drug trafficking, and terrorist financing risks due to poor anti-money laundering (AML) controls

    On June 12, 2012, two French judges issued an arrest warrant for Teodorin Obiang, who is agriculture minister and the son of Equatorial Guinea's President Teodoro Obiang Nguema, on charges of money-laundering, judicial sources said on Friday.

    The judges, Roger Le Loire and Rene Grouman, suspect Teodorin Obiang of stealing state funds to buy real estate in France. Teodorin has denied any wrongdoing.

The British High Court blocked the extradition to Minnesota of Shawn Sullivan, a U.S. citizen accused of raping a 14-year-old girl and molesting two other underage girls in the 1990s.  The judges ruled that, because Minnesota's treatment program for sex offenders was too harsh.  The program allows judges in civil courts to commit peresons to the program, even if they have not been convicted of a crime or declared mentally ill.  Also, almost no one has ever been released from the program, the British court found.

On June 25, 2012, Jonathan Evans, Director of the Security Service for the United Kingdom, gave the Inauguaral Defense and Security Lecture at the Lord Mayor's in London.  Mr. Evans address, among other things, security threats posed by the Olympics, terrorism, and cybersecurity.

On June 26, 2012, the IRS announced details of its Offshore Voluntary Disclosure Program by issuing a new set of Frequently Asked Questions. 

The IRS also issued two press releases.  In one  it announced that its Offshore Voluntary Disclosure Program has resulted in the collection of more than $5 billion in back taxes, interest and penalties from 33,000 voluntary disclosures made under the first two programs. 

The U.S. State Department has released its annual Trafficking in Persons Report for 2012. Secretary of State Clinton described the Report in a statement, saying "This Report is a guide for our work. In the past decade, a global community of governments, non-governmental organizations, and countless other institutions and individuals have brought attention to this often-hidden crime. Through the work of many, this Report provides a clear and sobering analysis of the state of modern slavery.

On June 19, 2012, Wikileaks founder Julian Assange sought political asylum at Ecuador's embassy in London.  The Ecuadorean foreign minister said it is studying and analyzing the request.  Assange has said the effort to extradite him is politically motivated.  Latin American countries have a history of awarding asylum.  The Ecuadorean government does not have close relations with the U.S.

Mauricio Santoyo Velasco, once a prominent Colombian general and head of security, has been indicted by the United States for taking bribes and exporting cocaine to the United States. He also disrupted DEA and other anti-drug operations by tipping off drug traffickers in advance.  Velasco was popular for the security gains under his command, but the military remained rife with corruption.

Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks, will be extradited to Sweden, after his last appeal was rejected by Britain's Supreme Court.  Mr. Assange still has the option of appealing to the European Court of Human Rights.  Mr. Assange is accused of sexually assaulting two Swedish women.  The Supreme Court had earlier ruled against Mr. Assange on May 30th.

On June 8, 2012, the Department of State announced the extension of the “Memorandum of Understanding Between the Government of the United States of America and the Government of the Republic of Peru Concerning the Imposition of Import Restrictions on Archaeological Material from the Pre-Hispanic Cultures and Certain Ethnological Material from the Colonial Period of Peru” (MOU). The Department of Homeland Security has published notification of the extended restrictions in the Federal Register, effective June 9, 2012.