Pakistan rejects Indian statement on FATF

ISLAMABAD: Hours after India said it expected Pakistan to comply with the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) norms by September 2019, the latter said its neighbour’s statement on the FATF greylisting matter was “preposterous and unwarranted”.

Earlier in the day, the FATF decided to keep Pakistan on its greylist.

Welcoming the FATF decision, the Indian External Affair Ministry (EAM) spokesperson Raveesh Kumar said, “We expect Pakistan to take all necessary steps to effectively implement the FATF Action Plan fully within the remaining time frame i.e. by September 2019 in accordance with its political commitment to the FATF...to address global concerns related to terrorism and terrorist financing emanating from any territory under its control.”

Reacting to the statement, the Foreign Office of Pakistan said India’s statement was its yet another relentless effort to politicise the deliberations of FATF for its “narrow, partisan objectives” and to show Pakistan in a negative light. “Pakistan has consistently shared its concerns on this account with the FATF chair and members in the past and drawn their attention to high-level political statements and media leaks from India to cast Pakistan in a negative light and plead for Pakistan’s downgrading,” the Foreign Office said. It expressed hope that the broader FATF membership would take cognizance of this continuing malicious campaign and reject any attempt aimed at politicisation of the FATF process by India.

Besides keeping Pakistan in the greylist, the FATF has also given a September deadline to comply with its 27-point action plan. “The FATF has decided to continue to keep Pakistan on its compliance document [i.e. greylist] for its failure to complete the action plan items due in January and May 2019,” an FATF spokesperson said in a statement.

The next meeting of the FATF will take place in Paris in October where it will review Pakistan’s case and decide what action could be taken if member countries still find the progress unsatisfactory. Following the FATF ultimatum, the Ministry of Finance said the government was committed to take all necessary measures to ensure completion of the action plan in a timely manner.