PAK GETS 5-MONTH REPRIEVE BY FATF

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan received an unexpected reprieve in submitting its performance report to Financial Action Task Force (FATF) on its anti-terrorism activities after the global watchdog postponed its June meeting to October in view of the Covid-19 pandemic, local media reported.

“We have just received an intimation from FATF through the State Bank of Pakistan that our review scheduled for June 21-26 in Beijing has been postponed,” Dawn newspaper quoted a senior Pakistani official as saying on Wednesday.

Pakistan was expected to submit its performance report on 13 outstanding benchmarks for foolproof arrangements against money laundering and terror financing in the meeting.

In February, the Paris-based global watchdog gave Pakistan a four-month grace period to complete its 27-point action plan after noting that the country had delivered on 14 points and missed 13 remaining targets.

The official said that Pakistan was earlier required to submit a performance report by April 20 this year.

The country’s performance would now be reviewed in October.

“We will now send our report to FATF in August that would be reviewed in October,” the official said.

The postponement was apparently caused by uncertainties over the coronavirus pandemic, the official said, but the global health crisis had provided Pakistan with additional time to remove deficiencies.

Officials said that Pakistan had put in place a broad-based strategy for taking necessary actions to complete outstanding commitments with the FATF in February and was actively making progress.

FATF had strongly urged Pakistan to swiftly complete its full action plan by June 2020 or else it would be moved to the watchdog’s blacklist.