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Malta's primary anti-money laundering supervisor issued an extraordinary appeal to the country's top court not to hamstring its enforcement efforts amid an avalanche of legal challenges to AML-related penalties by local financial institutions and other firms. Malta's Financial Intelligence Analysis Unit, or FIAU, which doubles as the country's financial intelligence unit and anti-money laundering supervisor, in an Oct. 25 annual report disclosed that local banks, payment institutions and other firms filed more than 8,700 suspicious transaction reports in 2022—an increase of almost 20 percent year-on-year. But the agency also used the report to send a strong signal to judges at...