The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) has retained Pakistan in its ‘grey list’ as Islamabad failed to implement two of the total 34 recommended actions, including investigating and prosecuting terrorist leaders and UN-designated senior terrorist commanders for terror financing. The country has been on the grey list since June 2018. 

“The FATF encourages Pakistan to continue to make progress to address, as soon as possible, the one remaining item by continuing to demonstrate that [terror financing] investigations and prosecutions target senior leaders and commanders of UN-designated terrorist groups,” the Peris-based FATF said in its statement released after its plenary session on Friday. 

Significantly, the FATF acknowledged the high-level political commitment made by the Pakistani leadership to implement all the recommendations under the enhanced monitoring programs. However, one crucial action involving prosecuting senior leaders of terrorist organizations is yet to be fulfilled. 

In its statement on Friday, the anti-terror watchdog said Pakistan has taken “swift steps” towards improving its anti-money laundering and counter-terror financing regime and completed six of the seven items in the second action plan “ahead of any relevant deadlines expiring. 

“Pakistan should continue to work to address the one remaining item in its 2021 action plan by demonstrating a positive and sustained trend of pursuing complex [money laundering] investigations and prosecutions,” the statement added.  

Earlier this week, Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi claimed that his country had fulfilled all the actions recommended by the FATF, and the country’s continuation in the greylisting any longer would be for political reasons. 

On many occasions earlier, Pakistan officials have raised concerns over what they see as the politicization of the FATF, accusing India of lobbying to keep Islamabad deliberately in the greylisting for political reasons. 

With the latest decision, Pakistan would complete four years on the grey list by June this year, costing billions of dollars to its already struggling economy. The UAE has become the latest country to be added to the list this year. 

(SAM)