ATLAS Financial Solutions, a leading provider of financial solution services and Sword FircoSoft signed a Partnership agreement which enables ATLAS to distribute and implement Sword FircoSoft's solutions in North Africa. This partnership has proved successful very quickly with the implementation of at Tunis International Bank, a leading private commercial bank in the region.

In Tunisia, financial institutions feel a great pressure from the regulators and now, being equipped with high-quality watch list filtering solutions is a must have. Lately, the Central Bank of Tunisia issued a series of guidelines to help fight financial crime and terrorist financing, which the banks have to conform to. As Sword FircoSoft solution meets the requirements of the Central Bank of Tunisia, Tunis International Bank opted for Firco Filtering Suite.

Firco Continuity for SWIFTAlliance Entry (SAE), Firco Filtering Suite's module interfaced with SAE to filter SWIFT transactions, has been deployed in just 3 days. The bank is now equipped with state-of-the-art technology filtering their SWIFT transactions against the OFAC, European Union and United Nations sanctions lists thus preventing them from processing illegal transactions. Tunis International Bank also deployed Firco Trust as an all-in-one "Know Your Customer" filtering solution, to screen their existing customers as well as their potential customers before opening an account. They can filter all their customer files in a batch mode or make on-line instant queries to know if a potential or existing customer could represent a financial risk to the bank.

"We were looking for a highly efficient software to filter our in-coming and out-going SWIFT transactions, in order to comply with the latest regulations. Sword FircoSoft's solution answered our needs in terms of transactions filtering and customer files filtering perfectly. Firco Filtering Suite is flexible and highly scalable and was implemented in just a few days. The solution enables us to comply with the ever evolving regulations at a low cost of ownership!" said Mr Zouhaier Bhar, Tunis International Bank, Compliance officer.

"We have been delighted to welcome ATLAS Financial Solutions, expert in financial risk consulting, to strengthen our Partners Network. This partnership already proved fruitful in Tunisia and we are confident that our solutions and our combined proficiency will help the institutions meet the latest standards in Sanctions and PEPs filtering programs" said Christophe Destephen, Regional Alliance Manager, Sword FircoSoft.

Tunisia law requires that banks are equipped with anti money laundering solutions. Since Tunisia is becoming the financial center of North Africa some banks like Tunis International Bank (TIB) are looking for the most sophisticated application to boost its image and to show their customers and partners that they can rely on them.