Islamabad: The Asia-Pacific Group (APG) on Money Laundering has rated Pakistans level of effectiveness as ‘low’ on 10 out of 11 international goals on anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terror (AML/CFT), even though the country is now compliant on 38 out of 40 technical recommendations.
The Sydney-based regional affiliate of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) released an update, as of September 2, on the rating of its regional members suggesting that Pakistan had a ‘moderate level of effectiveness’ on only one out of 11 outcomes, Dawn news reported on Tuesday.
Under this ‘immediate outcome’, Pakistan extends international cooperation on appropriate information, financial intelligence, and evidence, and facilitates action against criminals and their assets.
A 15-member joint delegation of the FATF and APG paid an on-site visit to Pakistan from August 29 to September 2 to verify the country’s compliance with a 34-point action plan committed at the highest level in June 2018.
The task force found Pakistan compliant or largely compliant on all the 34 points in February this year 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.
Under the FATF-APG assessment mechanism, effective ratings on “Immediate Outcomes” reflect the extent to which a country’s measures are effective, Dawn reported.
The assessment is conducted on the basis of 11 immediate outcomes, which represent key goals that an effective AML/CFT system should achieve.
However, this has no direct bearing on an expected exit of Pakistan from FATF’s grey list during its October 18-22 plenary in Paris.
