Aus supports FATF greylisting of Pak based on its performance on tackling terrorism: Envoy

Australia supported the grey-listing of Pakistan by the FATF and will make a fresh assessment as to whether it should be put on the 'Black List', outgoing Australian envoy Harinder Sidhu said on Wednesday.

Pakistan was placed on the 'Grey List' in June 2018 by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), an inter-governmental body established in 1989 to combat money laundering, terror financing and other related threats to the integrity of the international financial system.

During an interaction with a select group of journalists, the envoy said that "from Australia's perspective, when we say as part of our Indo-Pacific strategy we want to work with strong democracies in the region, one of India's great strengths is its pluralistic democratic tradition". 

"We welcome that in India, we look to work with India as a partner in the region building on those traditions," she said. 

When asked about the Kashmir issue and the prevailing situation in India in the wake of anti-CAA protests, Sidhu said it is "never appropriate for an envoy from another country to comment on the internal dynamics of any country". 

On if she was asked to join the recent visit by envoys to Kashmir, Sidhu said she does not wish to comment on it.

Speaking about the FATF, the outgoing envoy asserted that "a very technical approach" was taken by it to place Pakistan on the 'Grey List'.

"We have continued to support the greylisting because our assessment on a technical basis has been that it has not met the requirements. 

"Our approach to the FATF has been to take a very technical approach, that is, in fact, the most objective way to assess to what we are trying to get to: we really want to have a good outcome, which means Pakistan complying with the requirements that are imposed on it," Sidhu said. 

"We have taken a technical approach, we assess Pakistan's progress in objective terms against where it has got to thus far," she said.

Image credit: AP