The plenary meeting of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) will begin today and Pakistan has high hopes to exit FATF’s notorious grey list.
State Minister for Foreign Affairs Hina Rabbani Khar is currently in Paris to attend the two-day meeting. Pertinent to mention that this is the first FATF plenary meeting under the two-year Singapore Presidency of T Raja Kumar on October 20-21.
According to the details, delegates representing 206 members of the Global Network and observer organisations, including the International Monetary Fund, the United Nations, the World Bank, Interpol, and the Egmont Group of Financial Intelligence Units, will participate in the Working Group and Plenary meetings in Paris.
Read more: FATF: A politically propelled financial enforcer
The plenary meeting will also focus on jurisdictions identified as presenting a risk to the international financial system with an update to public statements that identify jurisdictions as high risk or being subject to increased monitoring.
After the meeting, Raja Kumar, the FATF president will address a news conference in which announcement to remove Pakistan from its infamous grey list.
Pakistan’s history with FATF
Following a meeting in Paris in June 2018, the Paris-based organization formally included Pakistan on its “grey list” of countries for deficiencies in its legal, financial, regulatory, investigations, prosecution, judicial and non-government sectors to fight money laundering and combat terror financing considered serious threat to the global financial system.
Since then, Pakistan has been working hard to meet international standards in line with the 40 recommendations of the FATF. In June this year, FATF had found Pakistan “compliant or largely compliant” on all 34 points and had decided to field an onsite mission to verify it on the ground before formally announcing the country’s exit from the grey list that finally took place in August and September.
Barring a surprise, Pakistan will likely be formally removed from the FATF gray list later this week, after FATF's October plenary concludes on Friday.
This would be a big reputational boost for Pakistan & it would ease some investor concerns at a very difficult economic moment.— Michael Kugelman (@MichaelKugelman) October 17, 2022
The FATF plenary will make the final decision after examining the assessment by the on-site team that visited Pakistan last month. Based on the team’s report, the FATF is expected to provide relief to Pakistan after verifying the country’s steps to implement the plan of action.
Read more: How Pakistan successfully implemented FATF’s Action Plan?