Pakistan has fully complied with 24 out of the 27 points on the items on the FATF list
Pakistan’s government is satisfied with its progress on the 27 point program from the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) and is confident that a move to the dreaded blacklist is out of the question now. The government is also confident that the three points with partial compliance will be fully complied with within the near future.
Federal Minister of Industries and Production Hammad Azhar, who is also the chairman of the FATF Coordination Committee, said that there is no chance of Pakistan being moved to the blacklist with its significant progress on the list from FATF. He also said that the remaining three points on the FATF’s action plan will be completed soon.
“At the previous plenary, FATF countries and the FATF secretariat said that blacklisting was not an option because the country has achieved significant progress,” said Azhar. “A lot of work has been done on the three points in which we are partially complaint. In my eyes, we are close to being largely compliant in these areas.”
The minister added that Pakistan had the option not to report during the COVID-19 pandemic but decided to continue doing so. “We had the option to not report during the coronavirus pandemic [but] Pakistan fulfilled its objectives during the difficult times of coronavirus,” said Azhar.
FATF’s President Dr. Marcus Pleyer also said that Pakistan has by and large complied with 24 action items on the list of 27 and expressed hope that the partially complied ones will quickly be addressed as well. FATF is a Paris-based global watchdog on terrorist financing and money laundering.
“To date, Pakistan has made progress across all action plan items and has now largely addressed 24 of the 27 action items. As all action plan deadlines have expired, the FATF strongly urges Pakistan to swiftly complete its full action plan before June 2021,” Pleyer said.