In Focus: Sanctions Watch – September 2025

Sam Cousins is a Senior Associate at ACAMS, where his work includes supporting public-private partnerships and strengthening ACAMS thought leadership pillar through the development of content on sanctions and risk, particularly the Sanctions Masterclass program and Global Monthly Update. Sam's work also focuses on countering ransomware financing, which includes enhancing industry awareness of the anti-financial crime risks associated with ransomware attacks and supporting the mitigation of those risks through policies, training and public-private dialogue.

Prior to ACAMS, Sam worked on the Sanctions Policy team at UK Finance - the trade association for the UK banking sector.

George is a global expert anti-financial crime at ACAMS and member of ACAMS' global SMEs team. He previously headed the Paris branch of a leading corporate intelligence consultancy and has strong credentials in corporate investigations and political risk analysis.

An ACAMS-certified global sanctions specialist (CGSS) and certified anti-money laundering specialist (CAMS), he has expertise in the geopolitics, security and economics of wider Europe and the former Soviet Union. George has written extensively on international affairs and has published to date two books and hundreds of articles.

Justine draws on a diverse global career, working across government, regulatory, private sector, and international organisations. As an expert on sanctions, counterterrorism, and financial crime she has held specialist positions within the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority, HM Treasury, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (Central Asia), the British Bankers’ Association, and UK Finance. In addition, Justine was formerly part of the UK delegation to the Financial Action Task Force, chaired the European Banking Federation’s Sanctions Expert Group, co-chaired the UK Joint Money Laundering Intelligence Taskforce’s counterterrorist financing group and served as an International Monetary Fund advisor to Nigeria. She has acted as an independent Syria sanctions-humanitarian expert to the United Nations, and previously served as a national expert on the financing of weapons of mass destruction (WMD)/counter proliferation financing matters. 
 
In her role within ACAMS, the world’s leading membership organization with a presence in over 180 jurisdictions, Justine oversees the subject-matter-expert division. A regular contributor to media publications covering financial-crime issues, she has addressed UN expert groupings, given evidence to parliamentary hearings, and authored numerous publications. Justine also holds a Ph.D. from the University of St. Andrews and an M.Sc. from the University of Edinburgh.