The Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) on Thursday - the last day of a three-day meeting with APG team - briefed the visiting team on the international cooperation agreements and maintained that information sharing under OECD and agreements with other countries have been started to deal with offshore accounts.
The SECP, sources stated, also argued that an effective check on money laundering is ensured but the APG delegation was more interested in specific measures taken with regard to NPOs'' financing.
The APG team and Pakistani authorities, according to sources, held four sessions and the Pakistan side was headed by the Director General Financial Monitoring Unit (FMU) functioning in State Bank of Pakistan.
In the first session, Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) and the Foreign Office gave presentations on international cooperation provided with regard to sharing of financial intelligence, evidences, IOM signed, etc.
In the second session, the SECP gave presentation on enforcement/supervision of AML/CFT regime in financial institutions/companies/non-banking finance companies (NBFCs).
The SECP has informed the delegation that in order to ensure that criminals are not able to hide their identity through use of complex ownership structure of companies, partnerships, trusts or other similar forms, the financial institutions are required to identify the ultimate beneficial owner.
Moreover, financial institutions are now required to carry out self-risk assessment relating to money laundering and terrorist financing risks faced by them. This requirement envisages instilling greater self-awareness in financial institutions and accordingly, enabling them to implement internal control measures that commensurate with their risk profile. Other new provisions cover correspondent relationship between Pakistani financial institutions and their foreign counterparts, assessment of money laundering risks by the financial institutions of any new product or technology before its launch, implementation of AML/CFT controls at financial group level and AML/CFT requirements for foreign branches and subsidiaries of Pakistani financial institutions.
There are certain changes and additional provisions in the regulations that make them substantially better equipped in serving its purpose than the previous regime. The focus has been enhanced towards high-risk areas and taking a risk-based approach towards combating money laundering and financing of terrorism. High-risk categories, inter alia, include politically exposed persons, legal persons and legal arrangements with complex ownership structures and not-for-profit organisations.
Law Enforcement Agencies (LEA) and FMU briefed the meeting on deployment of adequate prevention measures in financial institutions/companies. They also briefed on details, nature and actions on suspicious transaction report (STR) generated by regulators and confiscation of proceeds of crime with regards of AML/CFT etc.
When contacted the Foreign Office Spokesperson Dr Muhammad Faisal about the reported dissatisfaction of the APG team over the measures undertaken by Pakistan, he declined to comment, saying it does not come under the domain of the Foreign Office to comment.
Minister for information Fawad Chaudhry in response to a question about visiting APG team to review Pakistan''s progress to the FATF standards on Anti-Money Laundering/Counter Terror Financing, stated that a report would be submitted on April 15.
He added that two meetings of the FATF would be held with one in May 2018 and other in September and Pakistan is moving in the right direction by taking required measures to ensure compliance with the FATF standards in September 2019.
Sources said that APG team will submit assessment to the FATF and the decision whether the country''s progress was satisfactory or not would be taken in May-June 2019.