Pakistan Out of FATF’s Inglorious Grey List on Terror Financing

Pakistan Out of FATF's Inglorious Grey List on Terror Financing

The FATF said it welcomes Pakistan's significant progress in improving its AML/CFT regime. Pakistan is, therefore, no longer subject to the FATF's increased monitoring process.

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In a relief for Pakistan, the Financial Action Task Force on 21st October 2022 removed Pakistan from its grey list, citing that the country has shown significant progress in improving its AML/CFT regime.

Congratulations to the people of Pakistan for coming out of FATF grey list after four years of hard work by Government, institutions & individuals. Credit to all those who worked tirelessly, made changes in our laws & implemented the will to fight illegal movement of money 👏👏👏
— The President of Pakistan (@PresOfPakistan) October 21, 2022

Along with Pakistan, the FATF’s plenary also removed Nicaragua from the grey list as it successfully addressed technical deficiencies to meet the commitments of its action plan regarding strategic shortcomings in the areas that the FATF identified in February 2020 when it went into the grey list.

What FATF said about Pakistan

The FATF said that it welcomes Pakistan’s significant progress in improving its AML/CFT regime and has strengthened the effectiveness of its AML/CFT regime. It has also addressed technical deficiencies to meet the commitments of its action plans regarding strategic deficiencies that the FATF identified in June 2018 and June 2021.

“The June 2021 action plan was completed by Pakistan before the deadline, encompassing 34 action items. Pakistan is therefore no longer subject to the FATF’s increased monitoring process.”

How has India Responded

“Due to FATF scrutiny, Pakistan did act against a few terrorists, including those involved in attacks against the entire international community in Mumbai on 26/11”, said Arindam Bagchi, the Official Spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs.

Our response to media queries on Pakistan and the FATF "Grey List"https://t.co/JDQQMeCMi2 pic.twitter.com/TxgCAQiRMJ
— Arindam Bagchi (@MEAIndia) October 21, 2022

“We have seen reports relating to Pakistan in the context of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) plenary in Paris. We understand that Pakistan will continue to work with the Asia Pacific Group on Money Laundering (APG) to improve further its Anti Money Laundering (AML) /Counter Terror Financing (CFT) system,” said Bagchi

Mr Bagchi also said that it is in the global interest that the world remains clear that Pakistan must continue to take credible, verifiable, irreversible, and sustained action against terrorism and terrorist financing from territories under its control.

Other outcomes of the plenary

FATF has added three new countries under its increased monitoring or grey list. These are the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Mozambique, and Tanzania.

Myanmar has now been added to FATF’s high-risk jurisdictions or blacklist. The FATF’s blacklist now contains Iran, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), and Myanmar.