FATF waives immediate sanction
against Guyana at Paris plenary
There was no vote on the amendments to the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism Bill (AML/CFT), this week, ahead of the recently completed review by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF).
APNU’s Joseph Harmon
Government had been lamenting the consequences of international blacklisting had FATF independently pulled up Guyana for a review. This did not happen and as such Guyana is now only faced with the scheduled May, 2014 review by the Caribbean Financial Action Task Force (CFATF). The Guyana Government yesterday said that the FATF plenary members accepted the CFATF recommendation that Guyana be reviewed subsequent to its next plenary decision in May. According to the Guyana Government, it was advised that neither the FATF nor the CFATF will be issuing any Statements emanating from the Paris meeting on Guyana and that the decisions of the 2013 November CFATF meeting and plan of action remain unchanged. In reaction to how the events have played out, A Partnership for National Unity’s (APNU), Joseph Harmon said that the Government “should now hang their heads in shame and apologise to this nation.” According to Harmon, Governance Advisor, Gail Teixeira, Attorney General, Anil Nandlall and Finance Minister Dr Ashni Singh, all knew very well that it was a bogus deadline but instead deliberately sought to mislead the nation and institutions such as the Private Sector Commission to create panic. “Why should we believe anything they say in future?” Harmon said that APNU in the Select Committee will press to meet face to face with members of CFAFT instead. He said that what the Government did was worse than actual blacklisting, when they leaned on the Organization of American States (OAS) and the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) to pressure the Opposition into voting on the Bill. “I am not saying we should not have a proper Bill but they were creating panic, they were lying to this nation,” said Harmon. “We don’t believe anything that Government says,” according to Harmon, as he reiterated that future actions will be guided by CFATF advice and not government representatives.
Presidential Advisor, Gail Teixeira
In the statement issued by FAFT yesterday, the main issues dealt with by the plenary were producing two public documents as part of its ongoing work to identify jurisdictions that may pose a risk to the international financial system. It also dealt with approving and publishing follow-up reports to the mutual evaluations of Aruba (Kingdom of the Netherlands), Austria, Canada, Luxembourg, Mexico and the Netherlands. FATF received an update on AML/CFT improvements in Antigua and Barbuda, Bangladesh and Vietnam as well as reviewed the voluntary tax compliance programmes in several jurisdictions among other matters. The FATF statement listed those countries found to be deficient and as such blacklisted as, Iran and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). FATF also listed Algeria, Ecuador, Ethiopia, Indonesia, Myanmar, Pakistan, Syria, Turkey and Yemen as jurisdictions with strategic deficiencies that have not made sufficient progress in addressing the deficiencies or have not committed to an action plan developed with the FATF to address the deficiencies. FATF called on its members to consider the risks arising from the deficiencies associated with each of those jurisdictions. Guyana was not the subject of any warned review and possible international blacklisting.