An investigation by Australian federal law enforcement agencies suspect Western Union money remitters of helping move millions of drug money out of the country the past five years.

Besides Western Union outlets, police probers also identified the branch of a well-known Australian bank that sent millions of dollars on behalf of Balkan organised crime groups. Operation Basti said the Western Union sub-agencies, located in Sydney, moved $700 million in funds from Australia by mixing it with legal funds or dividing it and sending the remittance in amounts below $10,000 which are not required to be reported to Austrac, Australia's anti-money laundering agency.

Western Union said it has cooperated with law enforcement on the investigations of specific agent locations.

"In the best of our knowledge, no agents or their sub-agents have been prosecuted for offering Western Union branded remittance services in Australia... in any event, we work closely with Australian law enforcement with the aim to deter anyone seeking to violate the service we offer," Western Union said in a statement.

The Western Union spokesman added it had routinely initiated action against agents whose compliance programmes were identified as inadequate. The actions include placing agents on probation and more oversight and termination from the Western Union network.

Meanwhile, another investigation by New South Wales authorities have discovered that a branch of a well-known bank was used by organised criminals in Australia to send dirty money, including those from drug traffickers, to accounts also in the Balkans.

The officials are concerned that the laundered money is being used by paramilitary groups in the region.