ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has set up a high-powered mechanism to ensure implementation of a 10-point action plan set by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) on Friday after the placement of Pakistan on the terror-financing watch-list.
“The government is putting in place a strategy to implement the action plan in the next 15 months,” the Ministry of Finance told Arab News on Saturday.
“Given the complexity and size of the action plan, the Minister for Finance has established a high-powered, inclusive and robust institutional coordination and monitoring mechanism to ensure that the action plan is implemented within time and the country is brought out of FATF’s Public Statement the soonest,” the ministry said in a statement.
The FATF – an inter-governmental body that monitors terrorism financing and money laundering – held its plenary meeting in Paris on June 24-29 to discuss issues relating to security and integrity of global financial systems.
“The FATF plenary approved the action plan for Pakistan and placed Pakistan on its Public Statement in the Ongoing Compliance section,” the ministry confirmed to Arab News.
The global watchdog also said on Friday that Pakistan has developed an action plan with the FATF to address “the most serious deficiencies.”
The 10-point action plan set by the FATF for Pakistan emphasizes that the country must properly identify the risk of terrorist-financing, ensure the application of remedial actions in cases of anti-money laundering and counterterrorism financing violations, take action against illegal money or value transfer services, enforce controls on movement of currency and improve inter-agency coordination.
The action plan further says Pakistani law enforcement agencies must properly investigate terrorist-financing activities, ensure the prosecution and conviction of relevant persons or entities, ensure the implementation of targeted financial sanctions against all proscribed outfits and ensure facilities and services owned or controlled by designated persons are deprived of their resources and the usage of the resources.
On Saturday, Pakistan’s Caretaker Finance Minister Dr. Shamshad Akhtar reiterated the government’s strong resolve to strengthen measures against terrorism and terrorism-financing, an official statement released by the finance division said.
Akhtar emphasized that Pakistan was steadfast in upgrading the anti-money laundering and counter financing of terrorism standards and ensuring their enforcement.
“This opportunity was instrumental in ensuring Pakistan’s commitment to the world for compliance to international standards and increasing the effectiveness of regulatory and enforcement regimes for its own benefit,” the statement added.
Khawaja Khalid Farooq, ex-chief of the National Counter Terrorism Authority, said the situation with respect to terrorism financing and money laundering has improved a lot compared with the period when Pakistan remained on the FATF’s watch-list.
“Now placement of Pakistan on the gray list is a result of a political move sponsored and lobbied by America and India,” he told Arab News.
Farooq, however, admitted weaknesses in the country’s investigation and prosecution system with respect to terrorism financing and money laundering and urged the authorities to improve them.
“Pakistan is damaging its reputation among the international community by lifting bans on outlawed outfits and allowing them to contest elections. We need to handle these issues carefully,” he added.
Economists suggest the government devises short-term and long-term strategies to deal with looming negative economic impact and ensures implementation of the action plan within the given time.
Dr. Vaqar Ahmed, joint executive director at the Sustainable Development Policy Institute, said the top officials from the Ministry of Finance should immediately take the financial sector into confidence over the placement of Pakistan on the gray list to address uncertainty in the capital and stock markets.
“The government should constitute a working group of experts which could recommend plausible steps within one month to plug loopholes in our banking and financial systems in the long term,” he told Arab News.
Ahmed said the government should also focus on improving its diplomacy as Pakistan will again need at least three votes in the 37-member FATF to be off the gray list.
"Pakistan needs to address apprehensions of friendly countries, especially Saudi Arabia and China, on its financial system to get their votes next time,” Ahmed added.
Pakistan establishes ‘high-powered’ mechanism to implement plan against financing terror
Pakistan establishes ‘high-powered’ mechanism to implement plan against financing terror
- The global watchdog also said on Friday that Pakistan has developed an action plan with the FATF to address “the most serious deficiencies”
- Pakistan is damaging its reputation among the international community by lifting bans on outlawed outfits and allowing them to contest elections
‘A den of bandits’: Rwanda closes thousands of evangelical churches
- A 2018 law introduced new rules on health, safety, and financial disclosures, and requires all preachers to have theological training
- Observers say the real reason for the closures comes down to control, noting that even those who complied with the law had been shut down
- President Kagame has described the church as a relic of the colonial period, a chapter of its history with which the country is still grappling
KIGALI: Grace Room Ministries once filled giant stadiums in Rwanda three times a week before the evangelical organization was shut down in May.
It is one of the 10,000 churches reportedly closed by the government for failing to comply with a 2018 law designed to regulate places of worship.
The law introduced new rules on health, safety, and financial disclosures, and requires all preachers to have theological training.
President Paul Kagame has been vocal in his criticisms of the evangelical churches that have sprouted across the small country in Africa’s Great Lakes region.
“If it were up to me I wouldn’t even reopen a single church,” Kagame told a news briefing last month.
“In all the development challenges we are dealing with, the wars... our country’s survival — what is the role of these churches? Are they also providing jobs? Many are just thieving... some churches are just a den of bandits,” he said.
The vast majority of Rwandans are Christian according to a 2024 census, with many now traveling long and costly distances to find places to pray.
Observers say the real reason for the closures comes down to control.
Kagame’s government is saying “there’s no rival in terms of influence,” Louis Gitinywa, a lawyer and political analyst based in Kigali, told AFP.
The ruling party “bristles when an organization or individual gains influence,” he said, a view also expressed to AFP by an anonymous government official.
‘Deceived’
The 2018 law requires churches to submit annual action plans stating how they align with “national values.” All donations must be channelled through registered accounts.
Pastor Sam Rugira, whose two church branches were shut down last year for failing to meet fire safety regulations, said the rules mostly affected new evangelical churches that have “mushroomed” in recent years.
But Kagame has described the church as a relic of the colonial period, a chapter of its history with which the country is still grappling.
“You have been deceived by the colonizers and you let yourself be deceived,” he said in November.
The closure of Grace Room Ministries came as a shock to many across the country.
Pastor Julienne Kabanda, had been drawing massive crowds to the shiny new BK Arena in Kigali when the church’s license was revoked.
The government had cited unauthorized evangelical activities and a failure to submit “annual activity and financial reports.”
AFP was unable to reach Kabanda for comment.
‘Open disdain, disgust’
A church leader in Kigali, speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity, said the president’s “open disdain and disgust” for churches “spells tough times ahead.”
“It is unfair that even those that fulfilled all requirements are still closed,” he added.
But some say the clampdown on places of worship is linked to the 1994 Rwandan genocide in which around 800,000 people, mostly ethnic Tutsis, were slaughtered.
Ismael Buchanan a political science lecturer at the National University of Rwanda, told AFP the church could sometimes act as “a conduit of recruitment” for the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), the Hutu militia formed in exile in DR Congo by those who committed the genocide.
“I agree religion and faith have played a key role in healing Rwandans from the emotional and psychological wounds after the genocide, but it also makes no sense to have a church every two kilometers instead of hospitals and schools,” he said.
Pastor Rugira meanwhile suggested the government is “regulating what it doesn’t understand.”
It should instead work with churches to weed out “bad apples” and help them meet requirements, especially when it comes to the donations they rely on to survive, he said.
