Saturday, 18 June, 2022 I 18 Dhul-Qadah, 1443 I Rs 15.00 I Vol XII No 349 I 12 Pages I Karachi Edition
Pakistan on cusP of removal from fatf grey list g
Global body says Islamabad substantIally completed Its two actIon plans
ISLAMABAD
t
saleem Jadoon
He Financial action task Force (FatF) on Friday announced kick-starting a process to remove pakistan from the ‘grey list’ after four years of rigorous monitoring of its efforts to combat terror financing, in a decision that will end the threat of Islamabad being blacklisted. “at its June 2022 plenary, the FatF made the initial determination that pakistan has substantially completed its two action plans, covering 34 items,” according to a statement issued by the FatF on Friday. on-site inspection mission decision was taken by the global body during its June 14-17 plenary meeting held in berlin, Germany. It added the initial determination “warrants an on-site visit to verify that the implementation of pakistan’s aml/cFt reforms has begun and is being sustained, and that the necessary political commitment remains in place to sustain implementation and improvement in the future”. the FatF will continue to monitor the covid-19 situation and conduct an onsite visit at the earliest possible date, it
added, without giving a date for the visit. the pakistani authorities said that the global body will next month send a mission to pakistan to determine the veracity of the government’s claim that it has fully implemented all the 34 conditions that the FatF had set in February 2018 and then in June 2021. pakistan had been asked to implement these conditions in 15 months but it took around four years due to complexity of these issues. the FatF’s decision will now require commitments from all the pakistani stakeholders to prove to the FatF’s upcoming mission that no serious deficiency remains in its anti-money laundering (aml) and combating terror Financing (cFt) regimes. the FatF handout also noted that since June 2018, when pakistan made a high-level political commitment to work with the FatF and asia pacific Group to strengthen its aml/cFt regime and to address its strategic counter-terrorist financing-related deficiencies, Islamabad’s continued political commitment to combating both terrorist financing and money laundering has led to significant progress. In particular, pakistan demonstrated that terror financing investigations and
prosecutions target senior leaders and commanders of un designated terrorist groups and that there is a positive upwards trend in the number of money laundering investigations and prosecutions being pursued in pakistan, in line with pakistan’s risk profile. In addition, pakistan also largely addressed its 2021 action plan ahead of the set times, according to the FatF. the pakistani authorities said that pakistan will submit its progress report in the first week of July to the FatF. the FatF team will then make on-site visits to pakistan in the last week of July and hold meetings with relevant government departments, according to pakistani officials. the on-site inspection team will submit its report to the FatF and on the basis of on-site team report, the FatF will announce the decision of keeping or removing pakistan from the grey list in the next plenary. In February 2018, the FatF had decided to place pakistan on the grey list with effect from June 2018 and handed it over a list of 27 conditions that it needed to implement to exit the grey list. In the last plenary meeting, the FatF also acknowledged the “significant progress” made by pakistan in completing the required action items. earlier, pakistan had completed 26 of the 27 action items in its 2018 action plan and one remaining point was about cFt related item by demonstrating that terror financing investigations and prosecutions target senior leaders and commanders of un designated terrorist groups. the remaining action item was the most significant among all in the view of the member countries including the us and India, which have circled pakistan through the FatF platform.
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Pakistan seeks US support for IMF programme revival ISLAMABAD agencies
pakistan has sought support from the united states for the revival of the International monetary Fund (ImF) programme as the global lender has not yet agreed to a staff-level pact despite the tough measures by the government. according to details, Finance minister miftah Ismail and minister of state for Finance ayesha pasha met with us ambassador donald blome and sought washington’s support for the revival of the ImF programme. blome was apprised that the government has proposed fiscal consolidation equal to 2.2 percent of Gross domestic product (Gdp) in difficult circumstances. the us ambassador was informed that despite three rounds of talks and several virtual contacts, the ImF did not even share the draft of the memorandum for economic and Financial policies (meFp) with pakistan. the us is the largest shareholder in the ImF and has in the past too played a role in helping Islamabad complete the fund’s programme reviews. the ministry of Finance did not officially comment on the article. officials have claimed that the
memorandum forms the basis of any staff-level agreement and without finalization of the meFp no formal stafflevel agreement can be signed. pakistani officials further said that after the increase in petroleum prices and electricity tariffs, it was hoped that the global lender would be ready for staff-level negotiations. “However, the ImF is now demanding to withdraw tax incentives and collection of Rs150 billion additional revenue from the salaried class,” the officials added. the government has already massively increased fuel prices and abolished all subsidies. pml-n-led coalition government on wednesday has jacked up petrol price by Rs24 per litre. the announcement was made by Finance minister miftah Ismail, citing government was not in a position to bear more subsidies anymore. last week, the ImF country head said that “an important principle underpinning these (power sector) reforms is that all stakeholders contribute in an equitable manner to reduce the circular debt, between the government, Ipps and consumers, while protecting the most vulnerable consumers”.
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