FATF begins key meet on Pak, US urges action against terror

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan will on Monday present its report to the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) in Paris amid reports that the country’s efforts to tackle terror-financing and money laundering could fail to comply with the requirements mandated by the global body.

Pakistan, included on the “grey list” compiled by the FATF, has been under increasing pressure to stop financing militant groups op rating on its soil.

The FATF, in meetings being held in Paris from October 13 to October 18, will scrutinise if Pakistan should be blacklisted, which could entail extensive economic sanctions and impact a $6-billion bailout programme by the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Meanwhile, a top US diplomat said on Saturday that Pakistan should act against terrorist activities originating from its soil.

“As Imran Khan has said, Pakistan, for its own future, must prevent militant groups from operating on its soil,” said Alice Wells, acting assistant secretary for the Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs.

She said the US “welcomes news” of the arrest of four Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) leaders and hopes to see terrorists, including 2008 Mumbai attacks mastermind Hafiz Saeed, prosecuted. Pakistani authorities on Thursday arrested Saeed’s four aides on terror-financing charges, according to the country’s police. Pakistan was placed on the “grey list” last year, and a string of assessments by FATF and the Asia/Pacific Group on Money Laundering (APG), which monitors compliance with the watchdog’s standards, found that the country has failed to deliver on most components of a 27-point action plan.

Earlier this month, a “mutual evaluation report” by the APG also stated that the country was fully compliant with only one of 40 recommendations made by the FATF. Based on technical ratings, the APG report said that Pakistan has fully complied with just one parameter, largely complied with nine, and partially complied with 26 of the 40 parameters.

The report is among the materials to be considered by the FATF’s plenary and working group meetings this month before it decides whether to retain Pakistan on its “grey list” or downgrade its status to the “black list”.

The country’s economic affairs minister Hammad Azhar — who left for Paris with the Pakistani delegation on Sunday — will present the report at the FATF meeting.

Additional secretary, finance, Sohail Rajput, along with the representatives of National Counter Terrorism Authority (NACTA), Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) and Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) are also part of the delegation that will attend the crucial FATF session on October 14 and 15, when Pakistan’s case will be taken up. In June, the FATF had given Pakistan time till October to improve its “counterterrorist financing” operations in accordance with the agreed plan. It had expressed concern that “not only did Pakistan fail to complete its action plan items by its previous January deadline; it had also failed to complete its action plan items due May 2019”.

THE MEETINGS, BEING HELD IN PARIS FROM OCT 13 TO OCT 18, WILL SCRUTINISE IF PAKISTAN SHOULD BE BLACKLISTED