News Desk |
A delegation of the Asia-Pacific Group (APG), a regional affiliate of the global Financial Action Task Force (FATF), arrived in the federal capital on Monday, 25th March for parlays and to assess whether Pakistan has made headway on conforming to the global standards against money laundering.
The three-day talks between Pakistan and the nine-member APG delegation led by Executive Secretary Garden Hook will start from Tuesday, 26th March. The visiting assessment team comprises Ian Collins of New Scotland Yard, James Prussing of Department of the Treasury United States, Ashraf Abdulla of Financial Intelligence Unit Maldives, Boby Wahyu Hernawan of Indonesia’s Ministry of Finance, Gong Jingyan of People’s Bank of China; Mustafa Necmeddin of Turkey’s Ministry of Justice, Deputy Director Muhammad Al-Rashdan and Deputy Director;Shannon Rutherford.
If Pakistan fails to satisfy the FATF delegation to remove its name from the “grey list”, then a new plan of action can be given to the country. In February, FATF had directed Pakistan to take more steps to curb money laundering.
Sources quoted by local press said that during the financial monitoring Pakistan will be undergoing an evaluation process by APG. The key theme of FATF review methodology is the effectiveness of Anti-Money Laundering/Counter Financing Terrorism (AML/CFT) on the basis of immediate outcomes.
The APG assessment team will meet experts from State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), Securities Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP), Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA), Ministry of Interior (MOI), National Counter Terrorism Authority (NACTA) and Counter-Terrorism Departments (CTDs), sources in the finance ministry quoted by local press said.
If Pakistan fails to satisfy the FATF delegation to remove its name from the “grey list”, then a new plan of action can be given to the country. In February, FATF had directed Pakistan to take more steps to curb money laundering.
Read more: FATF appreciates Pakistan’s anti-money laundering steps
In June last year, Pakistan made a commitment to work with the FATF and APG to strengthen its AML/CFT regime and to address its terrorism financing-related deficiencies by implementing an action plan to accomplish these objectives.