Nepal needs to do much more to meet its FATF commitments: Report

The international Financial Action Taskforce has said that although Nepal has made some progress in meeting its commitments on combating of money laundering and the financing of terrorism and proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, much remains to be done.

The FATF has urged Nepal to address its remaining deficiencies and continue the process of implementing its action plan. “Since October 2012, Nepal has taken steps to improve its AML/CFT (Anti-money laundering/ Combatting Financing of Terror) regime, including by promulgating the Organised Crimes Control Ordinance and issuing enforceable AML/CFT directives for both the insurance and securities sectors,” the FATF said in its report after a plenary meeting of the inter-governmental body in Paris on Friday.

It said that Nepal should continue to work on implementing its action plan to adequately criminalise money laundering and terrorist financing; establishing and implementing adequate procedures to identify and freeze terrorist assets; implementing adequate procedures for the confiscation of funds related to money laundering; enacting and implementing appropriate mutual legal assistance legislation; ensuring an effectively functioning Financial Intelligence Unit; and establishing adequate suspicious transaction reporting obligations for money laundering and terrorist financing.

The international task force has given Nepal until June to show progress in the above mentioned areas to avoid being blacklisted.

It is worth mentioning that President Ram Baran Yadav had last week had approved an ordinance against organised crime “in view of Nepal´s commitment to international community to fight against financing on criminal activities.” nepalnews.com