EXCLUSIVE Crime, corruption and tax evasion - the hemorrhaging of billions of ringgit in dirty money from Malaysia, one of the world's top countries in illicit capital flight, continues unabated.

A total of RM173.84 billion (US$54.18 billion) was siphoned out of Malaysia in 2011, Washington-based financial watchdog Global Financial Integrity (GFI) says in its latest annual report that tracks capital flight.

Having catapulted into second position last year, when close to RM200 billion of dirty money was siphoned out of Malaysia in 2010, putting the country just under Asian economic powerhouse China in global capital flight. Malaysia is ranked No 4 in this year's GFI report.

GFI has yet to obtain data for 2012 and 2013, but these will be included in future reports.

For 2011, Malaysia is behind giants Russia (US$191.14 billion), China (US$151.35 billion) and India (US$84.93 billion). Still, the level of illicit cash flowing out of Malaysia is second highest in the last decade.

This is despite Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) having set up a task force in 2010 to implement measures to put a plug on the illicit funds leaving the country...