Islamabad, Feb 29, IRNA — Despite Pakistan’s expectations, the FinancialAction Task Force (FATF) in its recent meeting has retained the countryinto its grey list which according to experts show open bias and politicalagenda of the global body.
The FATF in its meeting held on February 16-21 in Paris decided to maintainPakistan’s status on its ‘grey list’ of countries with inadequate controlover curbing money laundering and terrorism financing until June, when thenext review will take place.
Pakistan’s Finance Division said that the country has made “significantprogress” in the implementation of the 27-point FATF Action Plan, which wasdemonstrated by the completion of nine additional action items.
Pakistan was placed by Financial Action Task Force on its grey in June 2018and was given a plan of action or face the risk of being placed on theblacklist.
Pakistan in an attempt to fulfill the FATF requirements had also followedthe instructions of UN sanctions committee and recently arrested the headsof some banned outfits.
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President of South Asian Strategic Stability Institute (SASSI) UniversityMaria Sultan, talking to IRNA that the FATF is not actually a counterterrorism financing tool as it is projected to be. She said it is in factpart of a larger sanctions regime which is used by the Breton wood systemand the powers associated with it, in short a US led Financial instrumentto pursue a policy of coercive diplomacy.
She said it is not a UN body but an independent treaty signed by 41 statesonly and does not include the leaders such as US.
“The IMF and world bank use the FATF conditionality to penalize the bankinginfrastructure of countries like Pakistan in order to have compliance inother areas such as counter terrorism,” viewed Maria Sultan.
She added in short it is neither an accurate instrument to determine theefforts made by the states under stress nor a reflection of the steps takenby the states or the limitations present in the system it is an economiccoercion tool of the alliance of the willing.
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Former Pakistani envoy to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) andsenior analyst Ali Sarwar Naqvi told IRNA that despite sincere efforts ofPakistan to fulfill the FATF requirements keeping the country into its greylist is highly unfair.
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Executive Director of the Center for International Strategic Studies (CISS)said that there is no doubt that Pakistan has taken stringent measures onterror financing and money laundering.
He noted that Pakistan has fulfilled most of the requirements of the FATFbut it has not given the country a clean chit over the grey list matter.
He added that this is basically a political decision to keep Pakistan underpressure. Former diplomat went on to say that one can see the open bias andprejudice of the FATF in its decisions towards Iran and Pakistan.
Senior defense analyst Lieutenant General (Retd) Amjad Shoaib Speaking toIRNA said the FATF is putting pressure on Pakistan on the behest of thewestern powers.
“They want to keep our economy under pressure,” he said. He added thateverybody knows that how much sincerely Pakistan is implementing the FATFagenda.
The analyst said that Pakistan knowing that this is a political move hastaken it a positively to show the world that we are law abiding state.
Amjad Shoaib said why the FATF is not asking other countries to takeeffective measure on terror financing and money laundering.
“The FATF is tool of big powers for arm twisting of other states andpressurize their economies,” he noted.
Meanwhile the Chinese foreign ministry had said that a majority of FATFmembers had recognized Pakistan’s efforts to improve its counter-terrorismfinancing (CTF) regime at the financial watchdog’s latest plenary meeting.
